Personal
Canada $2.75/US $2.50/FF 18.50/FL 8.15/SFr 8.00/IR £1.41 /BFr 99.00/
Lire 4,700/DKr 24.00/DM 9.5
World
September 1984 85p
BRITAIN’S BIGGEST MICROCOMPUTER MAGAZINE
Dressed to kill?
EXCLUSIVE SONY MSX BENCHTEST
Do it your way
So often, the solution
to a problem you're facing
requires a combination of
spreadsheet analysis,
word processing, database
management, graphics
and that vital ingredient
- ideas processing. What
you really need is a
program that thinks like
you do. Framework.'"
Perhaps you've looked at or tried 'integrated'
or suites of programs - bells, whistles and all.
Mind-bending.
Now, you're ready for Framework, from the
Company that brought you
dBASEII. You'll think it can read
your mind. Framework will
solve your problems the way you
want to, not the way other .
software makes you.
With one set of keystrokes and
commands, you'll be able to do all your work in
Framework. And with one learning curve, not
six, you will be able to provide complete
solutions from the moment you power-up.
Framework will read data from
dBASEII; dBASEIII; Lotus 1, 2, 3;
Wordstar and a wide range
of other packages.
Framework mns on the IBM PC
and 100% compatibles, and is
available soon on MS-DOS.
All things
considered.
Telephone 01 833 1173/6
01 833 2601/2 01 278 1371/2
No 2 Alice Owen Technology Centre
251 Goswell Road, London EC1N 7JQ
Software
Limited
ASHTON -TATE ■
Framework is a registered trademark
of AshtonTate. ©AshtonTate 1983
Everyone can benefit from
Effective Micro Training
at Digitus
Introduction to PC DOS
Provides a concentrated introduction to PC/MS DOS. Also
reviews hardware components and popular applications. £95.
Wordprocessing with WordStar*
A practical workshop course which teaches basic skills. £95.
WordStar* Workshop
A workshop to consolidate basic skills and teach advanced
commands. £95.
MailMerge* with Wordstar
Efficient use of WordStar for mailing using MailMerge £95.
Wordprocessing with MultiMate*
A practical workshop course which teaches basic skills. £95.
Lotus 1-2-3*
A workshop course with advice on the design of worksheets
and on solving practical problems. £95.
Data Management with Delta*
Teaches how to design, define and implement systems using
this powerful data management package. £95.
Information Management with Cardbox*
A workshop course on design, applications and
implementation. £95.
Introduction to Microcomputers
Provides a basic understanding of microcomputer hardware,
software and peripherals. Establishes the criteria for selecting
and using micros. Explains the rudiments of programming £95
Fundamentals of BASIC Programming
Develops the first principles of BASIC programming so that
you can produce programs on a microcomputer. Gives
practical hands-on experience of micros. 2 days. £190.
Improve Your BASIC
Brushes up and improves BASIC programming technigue;
introduces sophisticated methods of file design, data
organisation, access methods and control. Examines software
tools 2 days. £190.
Building Systems with dBASE II*
A detailed study of the dBASE II data management system
covering file design and indexing as well as applications
system design using the dBASE procedure language. 3 days.
£285.
•registered trademark
h
i
Aug 20
Sep 17
AUg 23
Aug 28
Aug 29
Sep 27
Aug 30
Sep 28
Aug 24
Sep 21
Aug 21
Sep 18
Sep 19
Nov 21
Aug 22
Oct 24
Sep 10
Nov 12
Sep 11
Nov 13
Sep 13
Nov 15
Aug 14
Oct 9
-NEXT COURSE DATES
n-j Hi,,.
TRAINING
I Send to, or phone:
" The Training Administrator, Digitus Ltd.
I Lading House, 10-14 Bedford Street,
® Covent Garden, London WC2E 9HE
|fel: 01-379 6968 Telex 27950 ref 3005
From .
Company .
Address ....
I
Spreadsheeting with SuperCalc
A workshop course with advice on the design of worksheets Oct 23
and on solving practical problems. £95. Dec 18
UNIX*
An introduction to the facilities of the UNIX multi-user Oct 1
operating system, including the file system, shells and editors, Dec 3
and a review of the problems of system management.
3 days. £345.
The C Programming Language
A tutorial on the main features of the C language, with Oct 4
extensive practical sessions on a multi-user UNIX system. Dec 6
2 days. £230.
UNIX and C: 5 days. £500.
Communications
Introduces the techniques of communicating between micros. Oct 12
from micros to peripherals and from micros to mainframes
£125.
SfcNEW: THE SYMPHONY SERIES#
Sep 3
Sep 5
Oct 1
Sep 24
Oct 15
Sep 26
Oct 17
Course. Date
ent Garden, London WC2E 9HE 1
31-379 6968 Telex 27950 ref 3005 __I
1-2-3 to Symphony*
A practical conversion workshop for existing 1-2-3 users. £95.
Introduction to Symphony
Provides a concentrated introduction to the main elements
including spreadsheeting, graphics, information management
and 'managers' wordprocessor. Teaches the basic skills
needed to use these features. 2 days. £190.
Symphony Workshop
Consolidates basic skills and teaches advanced features
including building systems with the integrated package and
command language. 2 days. £ 190. A|| course f ees are subject to vat
managing OFFICE
AUTOMATION
A two-day seminar t^rep^^m^^^^^^
to devise and implement asuec2*?, 9ement
automation strateav It aririr cessful off 'ce
presents current examples an ?** k<?y ' SSUes '
reZlTot *°
In-Company Training
Digitus provides courses tailored
to the needs of individual
companies, from seminars for
management to detailed
training for office and
professional staff. Courses can
be held on company premises,
or at the Digitus Training Centre.
Contact the Training
Administrator for full details.
Please book places as follows \^\ or send me more details [^\ |
Places
i
PCWl
CONTENTS
Cover photograph by Crispin Thomas
REGULARS
NEWSPRINT 90
The microcomputer business is playing
musical chairs at the moment, with some
contenders losing their seats—Guy Kewney
callsthetune.
YANKEEDOODLES
Allears,ourmanintheStatesbringsthe
latest newsonUSspeechtechnologies.
102
ORIENT EXPRESS
All is not quiet on the Japanese front, as
Shinichiro Kakizawa reports.
107
NETWORKS
108
Ourmanwithhisfinger in the dial brings you
the latest numbers to log onto.
COMMUNICATIONS
Readers fight back—brickbats, a few
bouquets, and our bludners.
114
BANKS' STATEMENT 118
Blistersonyourfingersfrom keyboarding?
Martin Banks is the man with the elastoplast.
NUMBERS
159
LEISURE LINES
159
SCREENPLAY
176
We reviewonly the best—
ignoretherest.
SUBSCRIPTIONS 192
One day your newsagent will go on strike and
then wherewillyou be?
BIBLIOFILE 194
Treasure troves or worth less nuggets?
Linnet Evans presents her pick of the
paperbacks.
MICROCHESS 196
Atlast. . .aprogramwhichexplainssimply
howto play chess. Nowyou'll get the chance
tocompetewith David Levy whocontinues
to triumph overthe machines.
TJ'S WORKSHOP 198
Tips and hints on howto make the most of
yourmicro.
COMPUTER ANS WERS 202
Programwon'twork,interfacewon't
connect, phonewon'tanswer? Don't
despair, thesolution'ssimple: write to PCW.
SUBSET 204
Machine coding at speed the easy way.
DIRECT ACCESS 208
Latest news from the clubs and computer
towns—plusTransaction File, Diary Data
anddetailsofourBenchmarks.
PROGRAM FILE 212
You name it and we've a program for it—be it
games, utilities or business listings you're
after.
BACK ISSUES 238
It's always the same: the ones that get away
arealwaysthebest.
ADVERTISERS'INDEX 311
Who's where in this issue.
CROSSWORD 312
And now we publish the answers as well (no,
silly, not in the same issue).
CHIPCHAT 312
Us, gossip? Never. Although, seeing as you
ask,haveyouheardtheoneabout. ..?
Founder Angelo Zgorelec Editor Graham Cunningham Features Editor Jerry Sanders Production Editor Ginny Conran Sub Editor Lauraine Danker Home
Computing Editor Tony Hetherington Business Computing Editor Peter Bright Consultant Editors David Tebbutt, Dick Pountain Editorial Secretary Tracy
Dear Group Art Director Jim Dansie Art Editor Peter Green Assistant Art Editor Paul Ballard Typesetters Meadway Graphics 198 Victoria Road Romford
Essex Group Publisher John Cade Publisher Tony Harris Group Advertisement Manager Peter Goldstein Assistant Advertisement Manager Philip Pratt,
Dik Veenman Sales Executives Claire Rowbottom, Sarah Musgrave, Tony Keefe, Mike Blackman, Paulette Letts, Amanda Moore Advertisement Assistant
Julia Vale Advertisement Production Jeska Harrington Production Assistant Bev Grice
2 PCW
BENCHTESTS & REVIEWS
DRESSED TO KILL 120
PCkVexclusive:Tony Hetherington
Benchtests the brightest of the MSX
machinessofar,Sony'sHB-75 ( andis
impressed by howfar the micro takes the
basic MSXspecification.
TIMETOGETSMART? 128
Symphony, Framework and Xchange—the
list of integrated business packagesgets
longer all the time. Bill Holland finds out if
there's a place in the queuefor Innovative
Software's SMART program.
POWER TO THE PRINTER 144
And powerto your pocket as well, as we put
two sub-£200 printers through their paces.
PAINTING BY NUMBERS 146
MikeLiardetfallsinlovewiththeQL—or at
leastwithitsAbacusspreadsheetand Easel
graphics packages.
EXPERTADVICE 150
ES/P Advisor is claimed to be a powerful tool
for building your own expert system. Patrick
Chang finds out if it lives up to its billing.
DIMENSION 68000 152
Just what does this machine think it is: an
Apple or an IBM PC? Peter Bright dons his
white suit to find out if the Dimension 68000
is a master of emulation or merely confused.
SENSIBLE SOLUTION? 162
Networked micros presentfresh problems
for database software. Kathy Lang finds out if
Sensible Solution justifies its name.
OLIVETTI M24 vs MAD 1 168
Is imitation the sincerest form of flattery—or
how many clones can one PC support? We
Benchtest two new IBM compatibles to bring
you the answer.
SAMPLING THE WARE 117
Atasteofwhat'sinstoreforthis September's
PCWShow.
UPGRADETOSUIT 132
Dust down those old VIC prog rams and
convert them to your 64.
BEATTHECLOCK 160
Tony Wi lliams explains howfiles of a useful
size can be sorted on a micro without a disk.
SPECTRUM FUNCTION KEYS 178
All you need to knowto program Spectrum
keys to execute a whole line of Basic.
TEACH YOURSELF LISP 182
No, NILisn'tthesameaszero,asDick
Pountain explains.
TOSERVEANDOBEY 136 IFTHE BUBBLE BURSTS 188
Well, your robot will if you follow Andrew Bubble memory is here at last, but what is it
Bang ham's simple construction advice. andwhathasitinstoreforyou?
PCW Subscription Enquiries Stuart Cruickshank Subscription Rates UK: £25, Overseas £40 Subscription and mail order address 53 Frith Street, London
WI A2HG, tel: 01-439 4242 telex 23918 VNUG© Computing Publications Ltd. 1983. Editorial and advertising address 62 Oxford Street, London WI A 2HG,
tel: 01-636 6890. No material may be reproduced in whole or in part without written consent from the copyright holders. Printed by Chase Web Offset, St
Austell, Cornwall. Distributed by Seymour Press, 334 Brixton Road, London SW9, tel: 01-733 4444.
PCW 3
GO 4th WITH
Ol COMPUTERS!
THE APRICOT
STARTUP
FROM
1495 +vat
monitor £195 extra
WITH WORDSTAR
The Industry’s most successful word
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AND PRINTER
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20 CPs fully Wordstar compatible
with optional Sheetfeeder and
Tractor.
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apricot
#1 COMPUTERS
Southampton House, 192-206York Road, London SW113SA
TELEX: 8954575CTCLDN
4PCW
Now Available
“APRICOT XI”
5MB + 10MB
FROM
£2695 + VAT
^ User training for you and your staff.
* Easily arranged credit terms.
^ Sophisticated technical and service
back up.
WE'RE CENTRAL
ARP EASY TO
TAKE ADVANTAGE
OF OUR
COMJPJJTER CLINIC
-Hot/tne - ext. 66—
Any performance or technical question answered
without obligation.
Call us for an appointment,
sales/mail order, or simply
drop in!
01-228 2207
Please send me a copy of
your introductory brochure
and details of the START UP RRCKAGE
Name.
Address _
_Tel No:.
Occupation.
^^Southampton House, 192-206 York Road, London SW113SA
SATAN’S
CHALLENGE
or
(Nevil Rides Out)
A Black Magic Adventure
Dare you take up the challenge laid down by the most evil and
sinister of all beings . . . the devil himself.
If you do you will find yourself alone and at the mercy of the
twisted fancies and whims of a cold and calculating mind.
Occult forces are threatening the lives of those near and dear to
you. Their only salvation rests in your hands but in accepting
the challenge your existence is put in severe peril.
In taking up the challenge you have to find The TALISMAN and
locate a pentagram which then has to be prepared for the final
rite. In the mean time forces will be opposing you making a
difficult task almost impossible.
Do not allow yourself to be lulled into a sense of security for it
will be short lived.
Many have gone before only to swell the ranks of the damned.
This is the latest adventure from the stable of Microtest and has
been written with the acclaimed features of other adventures in
mind eg save facility, quick response, simple but extensive
commands, a mixture of logical and fiendish problems to solve.
Be warned this is an easy adventure to get into but devilishly
difficult to end.
Cassette £ 7.59
Inc VAT
Disk(40or80TK) £ 9.45
Inc VAT
3" Disk version £11.45
Inc VAT
MICROTEST FONT ROM.
This exciting new ROM from Microtest will enable you to get all
sorts of new characters and fonts from your BBC Computer.
Once you have produced your masterpiece on the screen, all
ou have to do is use the inbuilt screen-dump utility to produce a
ard copy onto paper.
Typing ‘ * HELP FONTS’ gives a list of available fonts and blocks
of characters which they replace.
Available fonts are:
★Accents Accents and miscellaneous.
★Block Small capitals.
★Data Like the bottoms of cheques.
★Greek It’s all Greek to me too!
★Joined Standard capital with joined up lower case.
★Maths A mix of until now unobtainable Mathematical
symbols.
★Miscellaneous A few oddities which often are very necessary.
★Thick Thick text (for MODEs 0&3) to enhance 80
column mode.
★Thin Thin text (for MODEs 2&5) which makes modes
2 & 5 much more readable or perhaps
“READABLE ”,
★Vertical For labelling graphs.
★ 5 Dump Command for dumping graphics which gives
capability for positive/negative, rotate/nor¬
mal, magnified/normal, and indented
printout.
♦ Mode 8 Memory Frugal 10 column multicolour
display mode.
The ROM has a dump facility which will produce a screen
dump of any MODE from 0 to 8 on an Epson, Star Printer,
CTICP80 or MT80. The Mode 7 Dump is a text only dump.
After preparing a masterpiece you can then dump itto paper
as well as being able to position the dump laterally on the
paper.
The ROM uses absolutely NO user memory and can be used
with word processors etc as well as normal BASIC programs.
£ 17.50
inc VAT
P&P + 50p per item
available from
DAIRYFILE FOR DAIRY
FARMERS
Keep on that economic line between over and under
feeding!
Save time recording milk yield and calculating feed
amounts!
Quickly decide feeding policy with the ‘ Me nthly Calving
Group Performance Graph!
Print out a recording sheet with cows in numerical
order. Print out graphs or tables of indiv dual cows or
Monthly Groups showing serving and pregnancy
details, illness record, Calving Index, weekly and
running total Margin over Concentrate. See at a glance
cows due for serving, pregnancy diagnosis and drying
off. Keep track of weekly total feed cost and milk sale
price.
All this and more with DAIRYFILE.
Predict cow or Monthly Group total lactation yield.
Compare with Standard Lactation Curves. All old data
preserved—compare Monthly Groups over the years.
Which is the most profitable month?
Find out with DAIRYFILE — for up to 200 lactating
cows.
1 x 80TRK £ 69.00
or Inc VAT
2 x 40TRK
Min Hardware Requirement 2 x 40TK100K Disc Drives
or 1 x 80TK 20CK Disc Drives
MICROTEST LTD
18 Normandy Way, Bodmin, Cornwall PL31 1EX
Telephone: 0208 3812
OR ANY GOOD DEALER
DON’T WASTE TIME PON T WASTE VALUABLE TIME DON’T WASTE VALUABLE TIME STUDY ENGINEERS TIME
STOP - WATCH Management Services / Work Study Programs written and tested by professional Work Study Engineers STOP - WATCH
THIS IS A SELECTION FROM OUR EXTENSIVE RANGE OF DISCOUNTED PRODUCTS OF THOSE WHICH WE MOST HIGHLY RECOMMEND
HARDWARE — APPLE PRODUCTS
Apple lie 64k
£495.00
Disk Drive with controller (lie)
£200.00
Disk Drive
£150.00
12" Green Screen Monitor
£85.00
Videx 80 column card
£155.00
Accelerator II Faster than an IBM PC
£299.00
Fast Dos — Speed up disk access by up to 20
times
£20.00
80 Column Card (lie)
£63.00
Apple lie
£840.00
Conventional Time Study
£250.00
Production Study
£250.00
Activity Sampling
£150.00
Synthetic databank & SMV Compilation
£150.00
MTM Compilation of SMV
£100.00
Rating — Statistical Analysis
£125.00
Multiple Linear Regression Analysis
£75.00
The above software is being used by many large and
small industrial and commercial organisations — List
Available
PRINTERS & DISK DRIVES
Epson RX-80 Printer
£225.00
Epson RX-80/FT Printer
£250.00
Epson FX-80 Printer
£365.00
Printer Interface for Epson
£80.00
16k Printer Buffer
£115.00
64k Printer Buffer
£165.00
6 Mb Disk Drive (Floppy Cartridge Pack)
£855.00
5 Mb Hard Disk Drive
£900.00
10 Mb Hard Disk Drive
£1100.00
20 Mb Hard Disk Drive
£1950.00
Network — Shared system for use with Hard Disk £700.00
Work station Interfaces for Network
£150.00
Add 15% VAT — carriage FREE for cash with order.
MISCELLANEOUS — SOFTWARE
Car Hire— Invoicing/Analysis/Drivers Pay
£450.00
Basic Compiler
£140.00
Applesoft Compiler
£125.00
Typing Tutor
£20.00
Membership 500
£200.00
Membership 2000
£350.00
Word Processing
£90.00
Visicalc Apple/IBM
£155.00
Multiplan — 2nd Generation electronic work
sheet
£165.00
We can supply, deliver and install complete systems, train
and get your Work Study Department computerise
i your staff
id
Radiusend Ltd., Sweetlands Cottage, Couchmans Green Lane, Staplehurst, KENT TN12 ORR Telephone 0580 891986
6PCW
Before you make the mistake of renting from anyone else call OEM! Our total flexibility allows
you to rent for any term usually at a days notice; and with our wide range and high level of
support and service can you really afford to rent from anybody else?
B OEM RENTALS & LEASING LTD
150-152 King Street, London W6 01-741 7381
RENTAL HOTLINE- 01- 748 8404
PART OF THE OFFICE EFFICIENCY MACHINES LTD GROUP OF COMPANIES
IS PAPER WORK GETTING ON TOP OF YOU ?
CANBEYOUR
STEPPING STONE
TO EFFECTIVE FINANCIAL AND
ADMINISTRATIVE CONTROL
21 UNION STREET
RAMSBOTTOM, LANCS
PHONE: 0204 52726
1
2
3
4
5
6
PAYROLL
PURCHASE/SALES LEDGER
STOCKCONTROL
NON VAT ACCOUNTS
CASH PLANNER
MAILING LIST
£29.95
£29.95
£17.95
£17.95
£12.95
£17.95
ALL PROGRAMS AVAILABLE
AS A BUSINESS STARTER
PACK FOR THE SPECIAL
PRICE OF £99.50
THE PRICES ABOVE ARE FOR THE CASSETTE VERSION OF
THESE PROGRAMS, DISC VERSIONS USING RANDOM
ACCESS FILES ARE AVAILABLE FROM OCTOBER 1ST 1
ALL SOFTWARE PROVIDED BY ABACUS, IS FULLY
SUPPORTED BY THE COMPANY.
M1 SI
■ - >
3*?.S
PCW7
Fed like you're marooned?
The micro world has several islands that are good to live on for a while. The 8-bit CP/M island is
well-established and comfortable, but plenty of people are now realising that the 16-bit islands
called CP/M-86 and MS-DOS offer greater prospects. But moving from 8- to 16-bit can be
hazardous — and which 16-bit destination do you choose?
For the software developer or serious programmer. Pro Pascal and Pro Fortran are passports for
these three islands. Programs can be transported smoothly from one to the other, and in each
environment the acknowledged efficiency of the compilers ensures that programs make optimum
use of the facilities available.
Pro Pascal
• First-ever Pascal for micros to be
officially validated to BS 6192/ISO 7185
• Separate compilation facility allows large
programs to be subdivided into
manageable segments
• 64-bit and 32-bit real arithmetic
• 9-digit (32-bit) integers
• String handling extensions
• Random access file handling
Pro Fortran
• Complete implementation of the widely
used ANSI 1966 Standard
• Very fast REAL, DOUBLE PRECISION
and COMPLEX arithmetic and functions
• INTEGER is 32-bits, but 8-bit and 16-bit
integers are also provided
• File handling extensions from Fortran 77
include random access, error trapping
and end-of-file detection
Each is a true compiler, generating binary machine-code programs which make full use of the
capabilities of the machine. The compiled code is re-entrant, enabling ROM-based applications to
be developed. Files can be interchanged between programs coded in the two languages. Mixed
language programs can be written, and Assembler-coded modules can be linked in to object
programs, using the linker and run-time library supplied as part of each package.
The 16-bit Pro Pascal and Pro Fortran compilers run on 8086/88-based micros with 86K physical
RAM and CP / M -86 or MS - DOS, and each cost £320 + VAT. The 8- bit Pro Pascal and Pro Fortran
compilers run on Z80-based micros with at least 56K physical RAM and CP/M, and each cost
£220 +VAT.
ifespero
LANGUAGES FOR ^MICROCOMPUTERS
Prospero Software Ltd. 37 Gwendolen Avenue London SW15 6EP England Tel: 01-785 6848
A COMPLETE PACKAGE - ALL THIS FOR £499!
80K* RAM (Exp to 144K)
Full Stroke Keyboard
256K Data Storage Unit
Daisywheel Printer
Built-in Word Processing
Buck Rogers Arcade Game
Colecovision Compatible
ADAM
ADAM - £499
1 ”~~ ~~~ iitsauiin
MEMORY CONSOLE & DATA DRIVE
DAISYWHEEL
COMPREHENSIVE INSTRUCTIONS
COLECOVISION GAMES CONSOLE
QUITE SIMPLY-VALUE FOR MONEY!
If you're looking for real value in a computer system, one which can handle anything from serious Word Processing to
enhanced Colecovision style video games such as Buck Rogers, look no further. The Coleco Adam is here with a package
which will make you wonder if you're dreaming when we tell you about it. A price breakthrough in computer systems, Adam is
comprised of an 80K RAM memory console' with a built-in 256K digital data drive; a professional quality, stepped and
sculptured 75 key full-stroke keyboard; a letter quality daisywheel printer and a full word processing program built into the
Console. Two additional pieces of software, Smart BASIC and also Buck Rogers - Planet of Zoom ' (the ultimate in advanced
video games), are included as well as a blank digital data pack Adam can be used with any domestic colour Television set
MEMORY CONSOLE/DATA DRIVE: 'The heart of the Adam system is the 40K ROM and 64K RAM memory
console which combines with the 32K ROM and 16K RAM in Colecovision to give you a total of 72K ROM (including 24K
cartridge ROM) and 80K RAM (expandable to 144K) Built into the memory console is a digital data drive which accepts
Adam's digital data packs, a fast and reliable mass storage medium that is capable of storing 256K of information, that's
about 250 pages of double spaced text! The console is also designed to accomodate a second optional digital data drive
FULL STROKE KEYBOARD: The Adam keyboard has been designed as a professional quality keyboard that
combines ease of use with an impressive array of features It is stepped and sculptured for maximum efficiency and has 75
full stroke keys which include 6 colour coded Smart Keys which are redefined for each new application; 10 command keys
which are dedicated to the word processing function, and 5 cursor control keys for easy positioning of the cursor at any
point on the screen You can attach a Colecovision controller to the keyboard to function as a numeric keypad for easy
data entry It can also be held like a calculator, a feature which makes working with numbers particularly easy The joystick
part of the hand controller can be used in the same way as the cursor control keys, to move the cursor around the screen
LETTER QUALITY PRINTER: The Smart Writer letter quality daisywheel printer is a bi-directional 80 column
printer which prints at a rate of 120 words per minute It uses standard interchangeable daisywheels, so a variety of
typestyles are available. The printer has a 9.5 inch wide carriage for either single sheets or continuous fan fold paper and
uses standard carbon ribbons It is comparable to many printers which cost as much as the total Adam package The
printer can be used either with the Adam’s Smart Writer word processing program or as a stand alone electronic typewriter
BUILT-IN WORD PROCESSOR: Adam comes with Smart Writer word processing built-in This program is so
easy to use that you only have to turn the power on and the word processor is on line and ready to go Detailed instruction
books are not necessary as the Computer guides you step by step, working from a series of Menu commands It enables
you to type in text, then completely edit or revise it with the touch of a few keys Changes are readily made and a series of
queries from the computer confirm your intentions, so that you can continuously double check your work as you type
COMPATIBILITY WITH COLECOVISION: By using high speed interactive microprocessors in each of the
modules, the Coleco Adam is designed to take additional advantage of both the 32K ROM and 16K RAM memory capability
in the Colecovision. If you do not already own a Colecovision Console (£99 inc VAT), then you will need to purchase this
when you initially purchase your Adam Computer package (£499 inc VAT), making a total purchase price of (£598 me VAT).
WHAT IS COLECOVISION: Colecovision is one of the worlds most powerful video game systems, capable of
displaying arcade quality colour graphics of incredible quality on a standard Colour TV set. The console (see picture
bottom left) accepts 24K ROM cartridges such as Turbo and Zaxxon and is supplied with the popular Donkey Kong
cartridge and a pair'of joystick controllers. Colecovision has a range of licenced arcade hits available such as Gorf,
Carnival, Cosmic Avenger, Mouse Trap, Ladybug, Venture, Smurf, Pepper II. Space Panic, Looping, Space Fury, Mr Do.
Time Pilot, Wizard of Wor and many others So there you have it, Adam plus Colecovision the unbeatable combination
Send the coupon below for your FREE copy of our 12 page Colour brochure giving details on the complete Adam system
SILICA SHOP LTD.. 1-4 The Mews. Hatherley Road. Sidcup. Kent. DAM4DX Tel: 01309 1 111 or 01-301 1111
ORDER NOW - OR SEND FOR A FREE COLOUR BROCHURE
„
To: SILICA SHOP LTD. Dept PCW0984. 1-4 The Mews, Hatherley Road.
Sidcup. Kent. DAM 4DX Telephone: 01-309 1111 or 01-301 1111
LITERATURE REQUEST: _
□ Please send me your FREE 12 page colour brochure on Colecovision/Adam
□ I own a Videogame □ I own a .Computer
-i
Mr/Mrs/Ms:
Address:
Postcode:
ORDER REQUEST:
Please send me: □ Adam (add-on package only) £499 inc VAT
□ Adam & Colecovision (£499 +£99) £598 inc VAT
□ I enclose Cheque/P.0. payable to Silica Shop Limited
□ CREDIT CARD - Please debit my Access/Barclaycard/Visa/Am Ex/Diners Club
Card Number: .
TASMAN SOFTWARE
THE TASWORD WORD PROCESSORS
This is what they said about Tasword Two:
"If you have been looking for a word processor, then look no further." crash June 1984
"Tasword has gained an enviable reputation as not only the best word processor for the Spectrum but as a word processor better
than many available for other, more word processing orientated machines ." popular computing weekly June 1984
"The number of on-screen prompts, together with the excellent manual, make it ideal - even for an absolute beginner ."
PERSONAL COMPUTER WORLD September 1983
"Without doubt, the best utility I have reviewed for the Spectrum ." home computing weekly April 1984
"What makes a word processor more or less versatile is its control features. Tasword Two offers an impressive selection and the
tutor program succeeds in demonstrating them admirably ." electronics and computing April 1984
"Tasword is showing a degree of sophistication that business computers took many years to develop ." what micro? October 1983
TASWORD TWO The Word Processor * 48k ZX Spectrum £13 90
Your Spectrum becomes a professional word processor with TASWORD TWO. TASWORD TWO gives you an amazing 64
characters per line on your screen. This is ideal for standard A4 paper and TASWORD TWO prints your text just as it appears on
your screen.
Tasword Two drives the following interfaces:
Cobra RS2321/0 Port Hilderbay Interface ADS Interface Morex Interface
Euroelectronics Interface Sinclair ZX Interface 1 Kempston Interface Tasman Interface
The same program drives these interfaces. A short easy to follow set of instructions takes you through setting up your Tasword
Two to drive the interface you have or choose to buy. Tasword Two also drives the ZX printer.
Tasword Two is readily adapted for the microdrives to give super-fast saving and loading of both program and text.
TASWORD MSX The Word Processor MSX Computers £13 90
The Tasman word processor for the MSX microcomputer systems.
TASWORD CPC 464 The Word Processor Amstrad CPC 464 £19 95
The Amstrad Implementation of Tasword Two plus many extra features.
WORD PROCESSING SUPPORT
OTHER PRODUCTS FOR THE ZX SPECTRUM
TASWORD TUTOR free with all Tasword programs
Every TASWORD program comes complete with a manual
and a cassette. The cassette contains your TASWORD and
TASWORD TUTOR. This teaches you word processing using
TASWORD. Whether you have serious applications or simply
want to learn about word processing, TASWORD and
TASWORD TUTOR make it easy and enjoyable.
TASPRINT The Style Writer
A must for dot matrix printer owners! Print your program
output and listings in a choice of five impressive print styles.
Tasprint utilises the graphics capabilities of dot matrix
printers to form, with a double pass of the printhead, output in
a range of five fonts varying from the futuristic data-run to the
hand writing simulation of palace script. Drives all the printer
interfaces listed under Tasword Two and all dot matrix
printers with bit image graphics capabilities. You can also use
TASPRINT to print Tasword Two text files. TASPRINT gives
your output originality and style! Send s.a.e. for brochure
which inlcudes TASPRINT output.
TASPRINT ZX Spectrum £9 90
TASPRINT MSX £9 90
TASPRINT CPC 464 £9 90
All prices include VAT and post and packaging
TASWIDE - 64 characters per line!
A machine code utility program, TASWIDE doubles the
information that your own programs can display. Make a
simple change to your print statements and your output
appears on the screen at 64 characters per line instead of the
normal 32. Both print sizes can be mixed on the screen. 16K
and 48K versions supplied on the same cassette. £5'50
TASMAN PARALLEL PRINTER INTERFACE
Plug into your Spectrum and drive any printer fitted with the
Centronics standard parallel interface. Supplied complete
with ribbon cable and driving software. The cassette includes
LUST, LPRINT, and text screen copy software for all
centronics printers. The user changeable interface software
makes it easy to send control codes to your printer using the
method so successfully pioneered with Tasword Two. The
cassette also contains fast machine code high resolution
screen copy software for Epson, Star, Seikosha, Shinwa, and
Tandy Colour Graphic (in colour!) printers. Send s.a.e. for
brochure which includes sample print-outs and a full list of
printers supported by screen software. Compatible with
microdrives/ZX Interface 1 . £39.90
TASMAN RS232 PRINTER INTERFACE
Specification and software as above but drives printers
fitted with the RS232 standard interface. roo
* Available from larger branches of Boots
For further information on all these products send an s.a.e.
with "Tasman Brochure" written on the flap.
Send cheque/P.O. or Access number with order.
Telephone Access orders: Leeds (0532) 438301
TASMAN SOFTWARE
Dept PCW
SPRINGFIELD HOUSE
HYDE TERRACE, LEEDS LS2 9LN
10 PCW
y
Business Systems
COMMODORE 64
tii
Special offer £165
Commodore 64...£165
CZN Recorder..£39
Disk Drive.£174
Monitor.£174
Printer.£174
Printer 1526.£300
Printer Plotter. £99
RS232C.£30
Easy Script.£65
Easy Stock.£65
Future Finance.£65
Simons Basic.£43
Assembler Tutor.£26
Pat Speed.£43
English Language.£8
Biology.£8
Mathematics 1.£8
Mathematics 2.£8
Geography.£8
History.£8
Physics.£8
Chemistry.£8
Radar Rat Race.£8
Sea Wolf.£8
Clowns.£8
Jupiter Lander.£8
Music Composer.£8
Reference Guide (Book).£10
ACORN ELECTRON"
AT u nder £ 174, the Acorn
Electron is the first micro in its
price range to use BBC BASIC,
the leading computer language
in British schools.
It has many features you won’t
find on microcomputerscosting
much more. And its colour
graphics have the highest
resolution of any home computer.
Sowhetheryou’reinterestedin
programming or using the
constantly-expanding range of
software, it’s the ideal first-time
home computer.
PRINTERS
Silentype II Printer.£200
Imagewriter DMP.£385
Apple Colour Plotter.£660
Epson FX100.£459
Epson FX80.£339
Epson RX80T.£229
Epson RX80FT.£259
Apple Printer.£350
PaperTiger445.£199
Brother HR15.£399
Brother EP44.£220
Juki 6100.£328
Silver Reed:
EX500 Parallel.£299
EX500 Serial.£329
EX550 Parallel.£399
EX44 Typewriter.£273
EX43 Typewriter.£248
MONITORS
Kaga12"gn.£99
Kaga 12" amber.£99
Kaga 12" colour.£199
Kaga 12" hi res.£270
Kaga 12" super hi res.£399
RGBcolourcard.£78
SILVER REED
EXP 500
A letter quality Printer
16CPS Print-Speed
£290
Catch up
with your
kids.
Meet the
BBC Micro.
£320
The chances are that your
children already know the
BBC Micro. Because it's the
microcomputer which is
being ordered by the major¬
ity of British schools.
The same machine forms
the heart of the BBC’s
massive computer literacy
project.
It also has a wide range of
accessories which give it
truly professional capabili-
ties. And there’s an even
wider range of software,
covering games, education¬
al programs and business
programs.
THE
OLIVETTI
M10
CPU: 80C85 8 bit CMOS, 8k
expandable to 32k
The M10 is useful in business and
professional applications and in the
home. Typical areas of activity
include:
□ Office administration: mainte¬
nance of records
□ secretarial activities: word pro¬
cessing, filing telephone calls,
etc.
□ telecommunications for stock
broking or sales
□ electronic mailing
□ stores and warehouses: stock
control using a bar code reader.
JUKI 6100
A letter quality full-featured
daisywheel printer with
graphic mode and word
processing function 18 cps
print speed.
£328
MIGHTY MICROS
FROM CASIO
The PB 700:
4k RAM expandable to
16k-25k ROM graphics
£113
The FP200:
8k RAM expandable to
32k RAM-32k ROM ex¬
pandable to 40k, 20 char¬
acter x 8 line £260
THE
EPSON HX-20
£350
THE
EPSON
PX-8
wps?
THE EPSON PX-8 offers
the performance of a desk¬
top computer.
Measures 297mm wide x
216mm deep x 47mm high,
weighing just 2.3kg.
It packs 64 KB of dynamic
RAM memory & an 80 x 8
character LCD with a micro¬
cassette & RAM disk for
data storage.
It is supported by a very wide
range of peripherals.
THE PX-8 can access com¬
pany & national data banks,
and it can handle complex
data processing and analy¬
sis projections, reports,
scheduling, correspond¬
ence and electronic mail.
£798 + VAT
INTRODUCING A
BUSINESS COMPUTER
SMALL ENOUGH TO FIT
INTO A BRIEFCASE...
mm
. . . but big enough to handle a
variety of tasks!
Sharp's amazing new PC 5000
business computer has unlimited
potential. For instance, you can use it
as an executive word processor or
Database management System. Use
it to plan budgets and taxes and
forecast your cash flow. Or use it for
time and project planning, com¬
munications to other computers and
electronic mail facilities.
Thanks to its 128k byte bubble
memory you can even use it on the
move. Find out more about the
amazing PC 5000 portable business
computer at your local Sharp stockist.
Sham PC 500016-bit 8088 proces¬
sor, MSDOS operating system; LCD
screen, inbuilt printer, bubble mem¬
ory cartridges, battery/mains power.
ELECTRONIC
MAIL
RELAX FOR THE
FUTURE
EASY LINK
SHARP too
Now available in
Limited quantities
£130
MZ-70064K £129.95
Cassette Player £34
Printer Colour.£113
Printer P5 £250
Printer Cable.???
Joystick.777
Database £26
Word Processing. £26
Pascal Language £34
Non-VAT Accounts. £17
Easi-VAT. £26
700 Explained (Book) £6
SHARP MZ-80A
MZ-80SFDD Drive. C250
Expansion Unit. £50
Printer P4 £399
Master Diskette £25
MZ-80 API Interface £80
SHARP PORTABLES
PC-1500A Comp.777
PC-1500 Comp £120
CE-150 Printer £110
4KRamCE151. £39
8KRam CE155. £64
8K Ram Battery £79
CE158RS232 £120
CE158 Recorder £32
PC-1251
PC-1251 Computer. £64
CE 125 Interlace.£79
THE EPSON
CX21 ACOUSTIC
COUPLER
Portable
Transmission Speed
300 baud £160
TRADE IN YOUR PRESENT APPLE TO AN
APPLE lie, APPLE C, APPLE III & MACINTOSH
Apple lie 64ZK Computer — £587.
Apple lie 64K Computer (Disk Drive
with Controller — £795.
Apple lie 64K Computer (Duodisk
with Acc, Kit lie, Monitor lie) —
£1,095.
Macintosh Computer with free Mac-
write/Macpaint — £1,795.
Macintosh External Drive — £349.
Macintosh Numeric Keypad — £69.
Macintosh Security Kit — £34.
Macintosh Carry Case Deluxe—£69.
Macintosh Carrry Case Standard —
£39
Imagewriter Printer 10" — £385
Imagewriter Printer 15" — £525
I/Writer Acc. Kit Macintosh — £38
VAST LIBRARY
OF GAMES
Apple lie, lie and Macintosh
Telephone:01-9381588, exl 36
• 256K memory.
• Two built-in ports let you expand by simply
plugging in a hard disk, printer or plotter.
• Easy-to-use keyboard.
• High resolution video display.
• Over 500 business software programs,
including financial planning, business
graphics and word processing.
• Sophisticated Operating System (SOS)
designed to let your system grow as your
needs grow
• ProFile™ hard disk stores your data with
proven reliability.
• Four expansion slots let you plug in a
variety of accessories
• Extensive library of most Apple® II soft¬
ware, including CP/M® software.
Applelll256K
& SOS System Software
Monitor III
5MB Profile
Apple III ProFileKit
External Disk Drive
Catalyst 2.0
3 Easy Pieces
Keystroke Database
Keystroke Report
Backup III
Normal
Retail
£
1995
152
1100
95
295
128
295
225
125
FOC
4410
Promotion Price £2,999
TASHABUSINESSSYSTEM
191 KensingtonHighStreet LondonW8
VAT: Add 15%, Price are subject to change without prior notice.
Tel: 01 -9381588, ext 36
Telex: 946240 (CWEASY G) Ref: 1900120
Open for business
9.30am-6.30pm
Mon to Sat
Micro General the Specialists for Printer Selection
Contact us for our expert advice on all your Interfacing problems
It's not just a question of plug in and lets go. There are now over 200 different connector situations. How do you know that your
computer will accept the printer of your choice? We at Micro Genera! do not sell boxes off the shelf. As computer engineers we
help you to choose and install the right printer for your computer. The advice is free and it could save you some embarrassing
mistakes - Buy from us for peace of mind.
2 YEAR WARRANTY NOW AVAILABLE ON SELECTED PRODUCTS J
APRICOT FI - a full blown business micro
For the first time business user a genuine
business machine with some amazing ‘high
tech' features. - See the Apricots mouse
execute previously complex tasks at a single
key stroke, and the new infra-red device means
there’s no cable connection to the keyboard,
giving desk top planning a new meaning
• 256K RAM 720 single disk
• MS-DOS and Concurrent CP/M.
• Rapid Display manipulation and special
effects.
• Expansion and Outport facilities.
• Colour/Mono Monitor or VHF for your T V.
• Extremely light (under 13lbs) - totally
portable.
• Price includes SuperWriter, SuperCalc, &
• Well over 1000 software packages now LEASE FI from £6 per week
availabte CALL FOR DETAILS, DEMO NOW
BROTHER HR15 DAISY WHEEL
• Diablo code compatibility
• 3K Buffer
• 2 colour printing
• Super & Sub Script
• Auto underline
• Proportional spacing
PLUG-IN KEYBOARD OPTION-C150+VAT
+VAT
BROTHER TYPEWRITER/PRINTER EP44 £215
BROTHER PROFESSIONAL TYPEWRITER CE60 £395
+VAT
TRADE or PRIVATE CUSTOMERS take advantage of our
INTERFACING CONSULTANCY
INTERFACES & CABLES AVAILABLE FOR:
VIC 20
PET
SPECTRUM
ATARI
BBC
APPLE
NEW BRAIN
ORIC
DRAGON
COMMODORE 64
TANDY
SHARP
OSBORNE
SIRIUS
SAGE
SINCLAIR QL
4
INTERNAL
&STAND
ALONE
BUFFERS
from
£65+VAT
and more!
PRINTER SWITCHES
from £85 plus VAT.
CALL US FOR PRINTER SAMPLES
EPSON MATRIX PRINTERS
, V -
Prices /
Reduced
EPSON RX80T lOOcps £210+VAT
EPSON RX80F/T lOOcps £240+VAT
EPSON FX80 160 cps E360+VAT
EPSON RX100 lOOcps £390+VAT
EPSON FX100 160 cps £499+VAT
EPSON LQ1500 200 cps £1100-hVAT
MICROLINE LOW COST PRINTERS
• UP to 25% faster thru-put than
nearest rival.
• Near letter quality (92/93/84)
• Ideal printer for business
systems.
• High Res Graphics / ^
(92/93/84) /1|[
Microline 80 80 cps £195 < vat
Microline 82A 120 cps £275 + vat
Microline 83A 120 cps £450 * nt
(M82 A & M83 A serial & parallel
interfaces are standard)
Microline 84 200 cps £750 -r vat
Sheet feeder for IBM version available
M84 £299
Microline 92 160 cps £415 + vat
HIGHSPEED
HIGH QUALITY
LOW PRICE!!
Microline 93 160 cps
£550 + VAT
The ideal alternative
to EPSON FX100-
Faster thru-put and
near letter quality.
Recommended for
IBM, SIRIUS,
APRICOT.
CANON PW-1080A
• 160 cps and quiet too 1
• High Resolution graphics
• Down loading for user-optional characters.
• Near letter quality - italic, gothic and orator
fonts optional
• Epson Code compatibility.
STOP PRESS! JUKI 6100 DAISYWHEEL PRINTER 18cps-£355
DEALER/OEM ENQUIRIES WELCOME
ip ro
1 ^ 1 w . ■ Always call for the best possible price SSZ Access Visa
0 n 0 T0 I (PCW9) Unit 25, Horseshoe Park, PAN6B0URNE, READING, RG8 7JW Tel: 07357 4466
12 PCW
THE
EPSON QX10
OLIVETTI M24
PERSONAL
COMPUTER
192Kb RAM,
dual D/D discs,
Hi-resolution
Graphics,
cp/m, basic £1,735
The new Olivetti M24 personal
computer is operationally compati¬
ble with IBM PC.
This means it can handle all the
most popular software. But it hand¬
les it faster.
• MS-DOS operating systems
• Personal Application Manager (PAM)
• Memo maker
• Lotus 1-2-3 COMING
The M24 also has many other
unique features including a higher
resolution screen with 16 shades
of grey. A modular format that
provides greater expandability.
From £1,595 + VAT
HPIO
FREE
The HP 150 Personal Computer, with HP Touch
• ON SITE MAINTENANCE
• LEASE PURCHASE/RENTAL
• SOFTWARE TRAINING
• HARDWARE/SOFTWARE SUPPORT
• Unique Hp Touch Screen
• 16 Bit Power (8MHZ) 8088
• MS DOS Operating System
• Personal Applications Manager
• 256-640K RAM
• Built-in IEEE-488
• Built-in 2 x RS 232 s
• Self Test Diagnostic
• 27 x 80 Character Display
• Only 2.1 Square Feet Space
• Choice of Systems (5.15 meg)
• Full Graphics Terminal
• Optional Pop-in Printer
• Hp’s Own Optional Plotters
• Ultra High Resolution (512 x 390)
• 160K ROM
• New Hp 3.5" Protected discs
• HP Unique Disc Wear Warning
HEWLETT
PACKARD
HITACHI MBE 16000 PC
APPLE lie
• 14" Colour RGB Monitor.
• 128K RAM.
• Built-In RS 232/Parallel Ports.
• Twin Double Sided Floppies.
• Professional Keyboard.
• MS DOS Operating System.
• Microsofte BASIC.
• High Res Colour Graphics.
• 16 Bit 8088
Nucleous systems generator
worth £500
FREE
August special — high speed
printer worth £330
£849
DAISYWHEELS.. .
at an incredible new
LOW PRICE!
JUKI 6100
. . .just £329
20CPS; BiDirectional & Logic Seeking;
10, 12, 15 & Proportional Spacing;
Wordstar Compatible; 2K Buffer; 13
inch Platen; Underline; Backspace +
Lots more; Centronics Interface Stan¬
dard.
THE DAISYWHEEL THA T HAS NO
COMPETITION
OPTIONAL RS 232 TRACTOR AND SHEET
FEEDER
OWN A MAC
COPY II
PLUS £39.95
A set of disk utilities for Apple II combining the
most asked for features into one low priced
package includes BIT COPY SECTOR EDI¬
TOR; VERIFY DRIVE; SPEED COPY DISK;
DELETE DOS; VERIFY FILES; VERIFY DISK;
UNDELETE FILES.
DISK HEAD CLEANING KITS
How clean are your disk drive heads? Safeguard
against data errors — get a kit now.
£15.95
TASHA BUSINESS SYSTEMS
191 Kensington High Street, London W8
VAT 15%. Prices are subject to change without prior notice
Tel: 01-937 8529, ext 35 (line open for orders)
Telex: 946240 (CWEASY G). Ref: 19001120
Open for business
9.30am-6.30pm
Mon to Sat
Use a micro
without
UgfflffllL
one • *
WWir n#if9 Makin ^ this Possible
™*v • is our speciality!
Come into our office, and see
the best in personal computers
and their software.
Almost any leading brand
name you’ve heard of.
Then, if yon like, select a
microcomputer to RENT for
the period you want.
If you are happy with your
choice, a purchase option is
available. If not, you can try
another!
No matter which way you turn,
you get unbiased professional
advice. Plus training. Plus
maintenance. Painless!
Learning more is painless too.
Just post this coupon.
CCA (MICRO RENTALS) LIMITED
Unit 7-8 Imperial Studios,
Imperial Road,
London SW6 SAG
Telephone: 01-731 4310
A
Name
Organisation
Address
Telephone
PCW/9/84
CCA (MICRO RENTALS) LIMITED
fTiaP 3D Systems Ltd
MODULAR COMPUTER SYSTEM
CPU
Central Processor Unit
64k Dynamic ram
Full memory mapping
2 Prog. RS232 channels
Parallel keyboard port
16 parallel I/O lines
Uses SIO and CTC
Full interrupt control
Complete B & T £230
VFC
Video/Floppy Controller
80 col. by 25 line display
On board disk controller
Parallel keyboard port
Video switch option
CompleteB&T £214
Video only B & T £125
Floppy only B & T £125
RAM
Dynamic Ram Board
64k-256k On board
32k/64k Paging or full
memory mapping
64k Built and tested £150
256k Built and tested £285
Kits available POA
MPI
Multi Purpose Interface
Mix 87573" Disk drives
SASI/Winchester interface
Programmable RS232 channel
Programmable RS485
high-speed multidrop serial l/F
Uses SIO and CTC
CompleteB&T £185
FDC & SASI only B & T £145
SPI
Serial/Parallel Interface
4 prog. RS232 channels
16 parallel I/O lines
Full Baud rate coverage
Uses SIO and CTC
CompleteB&T £175
RTC
Real Time Clock
S/W support CP/M 2.2&Plus
Battery back-up
Uses PIO but still allows
use of parallel printer
CompleteB&T £45
DISK DRIVES
Boxed TEAC/TOSHIBA's c/w
PSU and all leads etc.
Single DSDD (1 Mb) £344
Dual DSDD (2Mb) £569
BareTEAC/TOSHIBA (1Mb)
POA
lOMbWinchesterSys £1350
LargerWinchester’s POA
MAPCOM
Complete computer system
4 MHz Z80A processor
64k Ram expandable to 1 Mb
Twin TEAC1 Mb Disk drives
Integral 12" green screen
80 col, by 25 line display
Programmable keyboard
Runs under CP/M 2.2 and the
new CP/M Plus (CP/M 3)
4 spare expansion slots
Winchesters available
MAPCOM+CP/M 2.2 £1760
MAPCOM+CP/M Plus £2192
(Includes 256k RAM card)
MAPCOM + CP/M 2.2+Winc
POA
RACPAK Rack mounted sys¬
tem more slots, more power
POA
MONITORS
Philips 12" green £86.50
Microvitek 14" Colour £250
Novex 14" Colour £230
SUNDRIES
6 Slot card frame ass
6 Slot backplane
3 Slot card frame ass
3 Slot backplane
Switch mode PSU
117 key cased keyboard
95 key cased keyboard
£60
£8
£45
£6
£75
£199
£145
77 Way edge connector £4.30
Box 10 5V4" DSDD £22
Box Dysan 204-2D 96tpi £45
SOFTWARE
CP/M 2.2 £110
CP/M Plus (CP/M 3) £257
MAPDOS (Nascom + VFC)
£40
MAPPEN CP/M word proc.£50
MAPPEN Maxifile ov.lay £20
MAPPEN Spooler ov.lay
Wordstar
Mailmerge
Spellstar
Datastar
Infostar
Supercalc
Supercalc II
dBase II
Cardbox
C Basic
Basic 80
Basic Compiler
Macro 80
and many more
Business S/W available
PRINTERS
Epson RX80/FX80/FX100 POA
OKI Microline 82A/83A POA
CI-300 Line Printer POA
and many more
£20
£295
£145
£145
£175
£295
£125
£199
£438
£155
£110
£241
£272
£138
POA
All prices exclude postage, packing and VAT
Dealer and OEM enquiries welcome
MAP 80 Systems Ltd.
1 Windsor Street, Chertsey, Surrey
Tel: Chertsey (09328) 68044
Or call in and see us at the Chertsey Computer Centre
14PCW
Compatible & faster than IBM PC
2 Drive System 128K £1,939
10Mb Hard Disk (XT) £3,899
‘Built-in Graphics & Colour
‘Runs Flight Simulator, Lotus 1-2-3 on
mono or colour
*7 IBM slots mtrnrnmgm
‘8 Mhz 8086 true 16 bit
NEC
16 bit 8086 128K RAM
2.4 Mb Disk storage
CP/M86 orMSDOS
Green Screen
Colour Display
Multi-
s user
NorthSta^
DIMENSION
The IBM compatible multi-user system
(up to 12 users).
15Mb hard disk and 2 user stations
complete with VDU running IBM graphics
£5 375*
Each subsequent work station ’
(8088 CPU 128K RAM) £1,275
‘including 6 months on-site warranty,
NEC APC RRP
Dot Matrix Printer RRP
Cables RRP
Wordstar
Multi Plan
£1985
FREE
FREE
FREE
FREE
You Pay £1985
apricot >k
5/10Mb Hard Disk £2,695/£2,995
Floppy Version from £1,495
New! Apricot 12" monitor with swivel
£195
sinus i
1.2 Mb Disk storage £2,195
2.4 Mb Disk storage £2,895
10 Mb Disk storage £3,995
LAP PORTABLES
DOT MATRIX
PRINTERS
CANON 80 Col 160cps
£319
CANON 156 Col 160cps
£399
GEMIN110X/15X120cps
£249/359
EPSON FX80/FX100 160cps
phone
EPSON LQ 1500
£980
Fujitsu DPL 24 240 CPS
£1,295
DAISYWHEEL
PRINTERS
FLOWRITER 1600 60cps
£1,600
TEC F10 40cps
£1,050
Tec FI500 25cps
£450
JUKI 18cps
£399
BROTHER HR/15/25
£445/£795
Fujitsu SP320 48 CPS
£980
8088 CPU. 128K RAM (expandable
550 1 Drive 160K
‘550/160 2 Drives 160K ea
555 2 Drives 160K ea
*550/360 2 Drives 360K ea
*550/730 2 Drives 730K ea
*555/360 2 Drives 360K ea
‘555/730 2 Drives 730K ea
*LCC upgrade
Monitor mono/
colour
laiiiL MH I
Compaq IBM Compat.
Kaypro II
HARD DISKS
SANYO
IBM
COMPATIBLE
16 bit
* runs most
non-graphic
software
to 256K) MSDOS
£749
£875
£999
£1,050
£1,199
£1,390
£1,550
£125
from £350
from £1,795
from £1,095
Hard Disks for IBM PC Sirius QX10, NEC
10 Mb £1,545
15 Mb £1,695
20 Mb £1,995
10 Mb Tape Streamer IBM PC £995
NEC 8201 16K
EPSON HX20 16K
TANDY 100 8K
EPSON PX8
£475
from £402
£433
£798
SHEET FEEDERS
BDT 2 Tray Auto £595
BDT 3 Tray Auto £695
BDT Single £375
Juki Sheet Feeder £239
Juki Tractor Feeder £99
Tractors (Qume RICOH, Tec) £139
PLOTTERS
Hewlett-Packard 74754A 6 Pen
Roland DXy 800 A3, 8 Pen
MODEMS MONITORS
Buzz Box. Direct Connect Modem
Sendata Accoustic Coupler
Philips 12” Green. Hi Res
TAXAN 12" RGB Hi Res
ACCESSORIES
Floppy Disks Printer Buffers
Daisywheels Paper
Ribbons Labels
Cables Computer cleaning kits
Disk containers Acoustic Hoods
SOFTWARE 8/16 Bit
The comprehensive range includes
WORDSTAR £235
SUPERCALC ll/lll £190/£249
WORD PROCESSING £
Spellbinder 290
Multimate** 332
Word w/Mouse * * 341
Spellstar 134
Grammatik 85
FINANCIAL PLANNING
Multiplan 8/16 bit 175/143
INTEGRATED S W me
GRAPHICS
Lotus 1-2-3 357
Open Access * * 430
FT. Moneywise 495
Framework * * 495
D BASE CORNER
FastBase inc RPG 185
Friday 185
Compsoft DMS Plus 195
UTIUTIES
Assembler + Tools
8/16 140
Macro Assembler
8/16 140/99
* * IBM PC DOS Only
d BASE II £349
SPELLING CHECKER £80
LANGUAGES
£
M Basic
215
MBasic Compiler
235
Aztec C Compiler
195
Innovation C'
345
C Compiler
245
Fortran 8/16
330
Cis Cobol/Forms2
399/105
Pascal MT +/inc.
SPP
240/350
ACCOUNTING
Pegasus from
275
Exact
750
Pulsar from
195
Sage
375
COMMUNICATIONS
Move-lt 8/16
90
GRAPHICS
Data Plot +
195
DR Graph
206
Graphplan
210
ESS Plot
295
Looking fora fast, powerful easy-to-use Spreadsheet 1
with integrated graphics and database for your
IBM PC, Sirius or Apricot
f Lotus 1-2-3 £357
This US bestselling software package has 4 standard IBM
PC soft sectored 5.25" discs. One contains a tutorial, two
are 1-2-3 system disc and its back-up copy, and the fourth
is a separate set of routines for printing graphic files
created by the main program.
'on line help menu
"fastdata handling
'easy error handling
1 33000 entries
'good documentation
FORMATS: Superbrain. Televideo. Sirius. Sanyo. Osborne
Northstar. 8 SD. DEC. Epson QX-10. IBM
ICL, H-P, XEROX, ALTOS. Apricot, NEC-APC & many more
All prices are exclusive of VAT
43 Grafton Way, London W1P 5LA (Opposite Maples)
Opening Hours: 10-7 Mon-Fri. 10.30-4 Sat.
01-387 4455 (4 lines) Telephone Answering Service After Office Hours
Telex: 8953742 /
PCW15
The Micro System
of the Year
A sweet solution for your
business
ACT Apricot
Britain’s best selling executive microcomputer system, including
256K byte memory, twin 315K byte micro disks, monitor, keyboard
with microscreen and the outstanding Epson RX 80 FT printer, or
a Daisywheel printer, together with MSDOS, Basic, Supercalc,
Superplanner and Superwriter for less than £2000 + VAT.
Complete business system as above with Sage executive
package including sales ledger, purchase ledger, nominal ledger,
invoicing and stock, now including Superwriter. Price £2495 +
VAT
Get it all done by Friday. Complete system as above plus
Ashton-Tate-Friday package from only £2195 + VAT.
New Apricot options: Double sided disks add £200 to above
prices. 10MB Winchester, add £900 to above prices. Larger 12
inch monitor add £100 to above prices.
Call us for a quotation, or send for our complete list of hardware
and software.
CHESTNUT HOUSE LTD
Longdene
Longdene Road
Haslemere, Surrey
Tel: 0428 54065 (24 hours)
16 PCW
AT COMDEX/EUROPE ’84
The only exhibition exclusively for
computer manufacturers from around the world
and resellers from all of Europe.
• If you are in business
asa:-Systemshouse
- Value adder
- Distributor
- Retailer
- Dealer
- Office-machine Dealer
- Office-product Dealer
- Volume buyer
- Systems Integrator
- Manufacturers
Representative
• Comdex/Europe ’84 is your
best opportunity to establish
valuable business relationships
with those who make products
you can sell profitably.
Representatives of leading and
innovative producers of
computers and related products
are ready to talk with you about
how you can expand your
business by selling their products.
• A group of conference sessions,
which discuss industry trends
and how to enhance the profit¬
ability of your business, will
also be offered.
Plan now to attend what can
be the most productive event of
your business year.
COfflMK/EUROPE *84
29 October -1 November 1984
RAI Exhibition Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
For more information complete coupon.
Yes I’d would like more information about COMDEX/EUROPE ’84
□ I am interested in exhibiting
n
□ I am interested in attending
Name _
Company
Address _
City_
. Title _
. Country
Telephone_
Return to: COMDEX/EUROPE, Rivierstaete, Amsteldijk 166,1079 LH AMSTERDAM,
The Netherlands. Tel. (31)20-460201. Tlx. 12358 iface nl. Telefax: (31)20-461634.
j
PCW17
WOW COST COMPACTMODEMS
CAPABLE OF BOTH V21& V23
OPERATION
The MS 21 /23 will access
computers, terminals and
various data bases such as
Prestel, Micronet800, etc., as
well as electronic mail services
from Telecom Gold. Link is by
cable from an RS232 outlet.
Fully BT APPROVED
Automatic Disconnection
620 Cable Connection to BT
Jack Plug Supplied
Self Test. Analogue loop in
each operational mode
CCITT V25 answer sequence
: *•>
• User selectable modes of
operation:
V21 (0-300bps) answer/
originate
V23 (0-1200bps) half duplex
V23 (75/1200bps) duplex
V23 (1200/75bps) duplex
• Bell 103 and 202 frequency
21231 AD
Please supply the name and address of my nearest
MS21 /23 dealer
Name
Address
Tel. No.
FEATURES
• Offers Intelligent Automatic Dialling in all
modes of operation • DTE Automatic Baud
Rate (ABRD) when dialling • Operational
mode selection by user controlled commands
• Stored number facility • Speed
conversion option • Error correction option
• Error and Status messages automatically
displayed to user • Extensive test facilities
• Full British Telecom's System Approval for
Autodialling Software
For further information cut out or call Dept. PCW Master Systems
100 Park Street, Camberley, Surrey pcw
DEALER ENQUIRIES
WELCOME!
0276-685385
Don't sett/e for second best, buy the modem the professionals
use
18 PCW
GUILDFORD
- COMPUTER
C-E-N-T-R-E
NOW AVAILABLE
KAYPRO 2 including CPM 2.2, M-Basic, Wordstar,
Wordplus, Supercalc, Uniform £1,095.00
KAYPRO 4 as above plus S-Basic,C-Basic, Superterm,
DBase II £1,595.00
KAYPRO 10 (io Meg H/Disk) as above, all prices
ex-VAT £2,295
1 THE QUADRANT, BRIDGE STREET,
GUILDFORD, SURREY GUI 4SG
TEL: 0483 578848
£500
REWARD
For information leading to the conviction of
the person or persons responsible for the
theft of EPSON HX20 COMPUTERS with the
following serial numbers:
019827
020891
019828
020892
019829
020893
019830
020894
019831
020895
Telephone in strictest confidence
0533741163
V
EXCEPTIONAL VALUE
ORDER NOW WHILE
STOCKS LAST
FIDELITY CM14 14"
COLOUR MONITOR
AT ONLY
£1 69.95 + VAT
= £195.44
12MHz Video Bandwidth
RGB RGBY and Composite Video
Just the right choice for all popular makes of
micros
CREDIT CARD
HOT LINE
01-482 1711
| PLEASE ADD £10 + VAT FOR DELIVERY.
POST YOUR CHEQUES/POs TO:
I DATASTAR SYSTEMS UK
UNICOM HOUSE 182 ROYAL COLLEGE STREET
LONDON NW1 9NN
Telex 295931 UNICOM G
PCW19
B.B.C. — SI00 EUROCARD
I.C.-1
BBC 1 Meg Bus.
Interface Card
£78.00
MSTAR
BBC 1 Meg Bus. Driver Rom
£32.00
EC-1
BBC 1 Meg Bus.
Extender Card
£28.00
MB-3
8-Slot Mother Board
£36.00
PP-1
Eprom Programmer
£47.00
BSPK-B
‘Beeb Speak’ Speach Card
£21.00
—
Pen Plotters, 3 Axis machines
P.O.A.
L. PEN
B.B.C Lightpen
£20.00
RK-2
1 Meg Case (supplied as flat pack)
£56.00
PS-1
1 Meg Power Su
pply
£44.00
PS-2
12v Power Supp
y
£45.00
PS-3
24v Power Supply
£45.00
PS-4
Hard Disk Power Supply
£65.00
PB-1
64K Stand Alone Printer Buffer
£130.00
Single 400K Disc Drive
£180.00
Dual 400K Disc Drive
£352.00
Juki 6100 Daisywheel Printer
£330.00
Shinwa-CPI CP80 Dor Printer
£180.00
Fidelity 14 inch Colour Monitor
£186.00
34 Way Cable for IC-1
£15.00
Printer Cable BBC Centronics
£8.50
BBC-RGB Videocable
£9.00
BBC-RS 232/423 Videocable
£5.50
BBC-RGB/EIAJ Videocable
£5.50
Box of 10 S/S D/D Floppydiscs
£17.00
Box of 10 D/S D/D Floppydiscs
£28.00
(Add £9.00 to Disc Drive prices for 1 Drive to be 40/80 Swichboard)
Please add 15% VAT + £1 P&P. Payment by cheque or bankers order.
Trade/Educational discounts may be available — refer.
Add £8.00 carriage/insurance for heavy or bulky items (Printers etc).
Dealer enquiries welcome. Send for SI 00-Eurocard details.
STOP PRESS
1.0 Box’ User Port MNI-Rack System for BBC now available.
BASYS
48 Sundridge Drive, Walterslade, Chatham, Kent
ME5 HHT
Telephone: 0634 660157
¥
INCREASE YOUR SYSTEM S
SPEED WITH ONE SIMPLE
PLUG IN UNIT
◄
INTERFACES
IEEE TO PARALLEL EXCLUDING P.S.U. IF1200
£65.95
IEEE TO PARALLEL IF1210
£69-95
IEEE TO RS232 IF1310
£79.95
PARALLEL TO RS232 IF2310
£79.95
RS232 TO PARALLEL IF3210
£69.95
CBM 64 TO PARALLEL IF3210
£59.95
PRINTER BUFFERS
EXTERNAL SPOOLERS (MAINS POWERED)
INPUT
OUTPUT
PARALLEL
PARALLEL 8K BIF2210
£79.95
PARALLEL
PARALLEL 16K BIF2211
£89.95
PARALLEL
PARALLEL 32KBIF2212
£99.95
PARALLEL
PARALLEL BIF2213
£129.95
PARALLEL
RS232 8K BIF2310
£99.95
PARALLEL
RS232 16K BIF2311
£109.95
PARALLEL
RS232 32K BIF2312
£119.95
PARALLEL
RS232 64KBIF2313
£149.95
RS232
RS232 8K BIF3310
£99.95
RS232
RS232 16K BIF3311
£109.95
RS232
RS232 32K BIF3312
£119.95
RS232
RS232 64K BIF3313
£149.95
RS232
PARALLEL 8KBIF3211
£109.95
RS232
PARALLEL 32KBIF3212
£119.95
RS232
PARALLEL 64KBIF3213
£149.95
INTERNAL SPOOLERS FOR EPSON PRINTERS
PARALLEL 8K SPOOLER BIF2220
£59.95
PARALLEL 16K SPOOLER BIF2221
£69.95
PARALLEL 32K SPOOLER BIF2222
£79.95
PARALLEL 64K SPOOLER BIF2223
£109.95
ALL PRICES EXCLUSIVE OF VAT
DEALER ENQUIRIES WELCOME
IBEK SYSTEMS
437 STONEY STANTON ROAD,
COVENTRY, WEST MIDLANDS
TEL: 0203 661162
Would you like fo transfer your Spectrum programs from
© MICRODRIVE TO MICRODRIVE © TAPE TO TAPE
© TAPE TO MICRODRIVE © MICRODRIVE TO TAPE
Then do It with
ZX Spectrum 16/48K
□□□□□□□□□□
□□□□□□□□CD
□□□□□□□□□□
(□□□(□□□acanci:
TRANS-EXPRESS is the most comprehensive package ot four m/c
utilities for transferring Spectrum programs. They are user- friendly
simple to use, reliable & very efficient. They go much beyond where
similar attempts failed, enabling you to transfer any kind of programs
up to the full 48.0 K length - provided you do not infringe copyright
TRANS-EXPRESS is an essential microdrive companion and an
invaluable software back-up utility.
We are offerring the entire package for £ 9.95 or a combination of
TAPE TO MICRODRIVE & MICRODRIVE TO MICRODRIVE for £ 750.
You can also buy each of the four programs separately for £ 5.50
only.
TAPE
TAPE
u ^ — — — _ — — _ _ _ _. — — _ — — —
Please send me a copyot TRANS-EXPRESS ® ©@© whlre amicable
I enclose cheque/PO for.„
(Please add £1.00 for orders outside UK)
Name.
Address.
113 Melrose Ave, London NW2
ATTRACTIONS
‘THE POWER BEHIND THE PRINTED WORD”
STAR GEMINI-10X
120CPS • BI-DIRECTIONAL LOGIC SEEKING •
FRICTION TRACTOR AND ROLL HOLDER
STANDARD • DOWN LOADABLE CHARACTERS
• ULTRA HIGH RESOLUTION • 80 COLS
£1 89.95 + VAT = £218.44
WHAT VALUE!
STAR GEMINI-15X AS ABOVE BUT 132 COLUMN
£315 + VAT = £362.25
STAR DELTA 10
160 CPS • BI-DIRECTIONAL LOGIC SEEKING •
PARALLEL AND SERIAL INTERFACE STANDARD
• 8K BUFFER • FRICTION TRACTOR AND ROLL
HOLDER STANDARD • 80 COLS • MANY MORE
FEATURES TOO NUMEROUS TO LIST.
£319
.95 + VAT = £367.94
STAR DELTA 15 AS ABOVE BUT 132 COLUMN
£460 + VAT = £529.00
CREDIT CARD
HOT LINE
01-4821711
PLEASE ADD £10 + VAT FOR DELIVERY. POST YOUR
CHEQUES/PO’S TO:
DATASTAR SYSTEMS UK
UNICOM HOUSE, 182 ROYAL COLLEGE STREET, LONDON
NW1 9NN
Telex 295931 UNICOM G
PCW21
SUMMER
SALE
We are having a Summer Stock Clearance Sale and are offering a limited
number of the following products at bargain prices.
COMPUTERS
Sanyo 1150 8 bit CPM with 6 Micro Pro Packages £850 + VAT
Sanyo 4050 16 bit (1 only) £1 495 + VAT
PRINTERS AND ACCESSORIES
Epson
MX-100.100 cps (limited number)
DX-100. Daisywheel (limited number)
CALL FOR MOST
COMPETITIVE
PRICES
Brother
HR-1. Daisywheel ex-demo (1 only)
HR-25. 25 cps Daisywheel (parallel)
£395 + VAT
£595 + VAT
Prism
P80. 200 cps NLQ. 80 column
PI 32. 200 cps NLQ. 132 column (2 only)
£595 + VAT
£845 + VAT
Accessories
Sheet Feed Option — Prism
Auto-Feed for HR-1
Auto-Feed for HR-15/DX-100
Epson Serial Interface 8145
Epson Serial Interface 8148
£59 + VAT
£295 + VAT
£195 + VAT
CALL FOR MOST
COMPETITIVE
PRICES
GRAFTEL (UK) LTD.,
13 Alexandra Road,
Farnborough,
Hampshire
GU14 6BU
Tel: (0252) 510200
ORDERING
Phone or write with order and
remittance
22PCW
ONCE AGAIN DATASTAR
OFFERS THE BEST VALUE IN
PR I N
JUKI 6100
DAISYWHEEL
ONLY £325
+ VAT = £373.75
FEATURES:
*20 CPS (MAX.) PRINT SPEED ‘BOLD AND
SHADOW PRINTING ‘SUBSCRIPTS AND SUPERSCRIPTS
‘WORDSTAR COMPATIBLE ‘DIABLO PROTOCOLS ‘AUTO
UNDERLINING ‘STANDARD 2K BUFFER ‘1 YEAR PARTS AND
LABOUR WARRANTY ‘COMPREHENSIVE USER FRIENDLY MANUAL
SHEET FEEDER, TRACTOR AND RS232 A VAILABLE AS OPTION
DAISYSTEP 2000
OUR PRICE £225
+ VAT = £258.75
FEATURES:
‘18 CPS ‘BIDIRECTIONAL LOGIC SEEKING ‘WORDSTAR
COMPATIBLE ‘QUME COMPATIBLE RIBBONS AND DAISY-
WHEELS ‘PLUS MANY MORE.
SHEET FEEDER, TRACTOR AND RS232 AVAILABLE.
NEW LOWER PRICES ON
EPSON, STAR & BROTHER
DAISYWHEEL PRINTERS
BROTHER HR 15 13cps
STAR POWERTYPE 18 cps
EPSON DX 100 18 cps
DOT MATRIX PRINTERS
EPSON RX 80 100 cps
EPSON RX 80 F/T 100 cps
EPSON RX 100 100 cps
EPSON FX 80 160 cps
£349.95 + VAT = £402.44
£328.95 + VAT = £378.29
£369.95 + VAT = £425.44
£198.95 + VAT = £228.79
£228.95 + VAT = £263.29
£384.95 + VAT = £442.69
£319.95 + VAT = £367.94
EPSON FX 100 160 cps
STARGEMINMOX 120 cps
STAR DELTA 10 160 cps
STAR RADIX 10 200 cps
£498.95 + VAT = £573.79
£189.95 + VAT = £218.44
£319.95 + VAT = £367.94
£498.95 + VAT = £573.79
THERMAL MATRIX PRINTERS
STAR STX 80 60 cps £129.95 + VAT = £149.44
BROTHER HR 5 30 cps £129.95 + VAT = £149.44
BROTHER EP 44 16 cps £216.95 + VAT = £249.49
PAPER — RIBBONS — LEADS — SHEET-FEEDERS — TRACTOR FEEDS — INTERFACES
CALL FOR BEST PRICES
CREDIT CARD HOT LINE
01-4821711
E3
PLEASE ADD £10 + VAT FOR DELIVERY. POST YOUR CHEQUES/POs TO:
DATASTAR SYSTEMS UK
UNICOM HOUSE, 182 ROYAL COLLEGE STREET, LONDON NW1 9NN
Telex 295931 UNICOM G
TAX-FREE EXPORT & DEALER ENQUIRIES WELCOME
PCWj:i
R
(HOME AND CONTINENTAL
COMPUTER SERVICES) LTD
Announces their total business package
for the ACORN BBC machine
The package comprises of:
Integrated Accounting
Systems for BBC 32K Micro
• Simultaneously and automatically integrates several
accounting functions, thereby saving hours of tedium on routine
invoicing and bookkeeping.
• Provides accurate and up to date management information,
including Balance Sheets ... all at the touch of a button.
% Modules available as above for existing BBC Micro business
users. Complete systems comprising Microcomputer, Disk
drive,
Printer and Monitor available from £1,299 + VAT.
All S/W fully supported by HCCS. Credit facilities (subject to status) written details on request.
Contact HCCS by writing to:
R. C. TURLAND or V. I. BROWN at
HCCS (Home and Continental Computer Services) LTD.
FREEPOST, 22 MARKET SQUARE, BIGGLESWADE,
BEDS.SG188BR Telephone: 0767 318844
The above delivered to your door by courier service and ready to run.
If an advertisement
is wrong we’re here
to put it right.
If you see an advertisement in the press, in print,
on posters or in the cinema which you find
unacceptable, write to us at the address below. J
The Advertising Standards Authority,
ASA Ltd, Dept 3 Brook House, Torrington Place, London WC1E 7HN
24PCW
ENSIGN 1650
I Standard
correspondence
and graphics mode,
friction and tractor
feed, 165 cps. Low
noise level, industry
standard ribbons. Impact
Dot Matrix; bi-directional
logic seeking; Format 9x9
(normal), 17x17 (fine script mode);
165cps (normal), 142cps (condensed),
lOOcps (elite); standard, condensed,
elite, enlarged, double density
modes; 80 columns standard
136 condensed; Centronics
Parallel, RS232C (option)
£ 269 .
00
+ VAT=
I £309.35
Under
£200
QUrTN
DATA
WONDERFUL
OPPORTUNITY
TO PURCHASE
A DAISY WHEEL
PRINTER AT A PRICE
YOU CAN AFFORD!
| Features include:
16CPS; Bidirectional; Logic seeking; Proportional
| spacing; WordStar compatible; 13" platen - 12"
print line; Autoscore; Bold and shadow printing;
Sub and superscripts; QUME compatible ribbons;
QUME compatible daisywheels; 4 level impression
control; Prints original + 4 copies; Low noise.
| A daisy wheel printer for £199 .00 £228^85
ITT] uppj y Orders can be phoned for
SSS ^ E * r H B ^ most major credit cards.
^- J5ass ‘ Mail orders with Banker's
Orders; Postal Orders; Building Society Cheques despatched
same day. 24 hour nationwide delivery by Securicor £9.50 + vat.
All orders covered by The Mail Order Protection Scheme.
p/\|/| 11/1 12 HIGH STREET,
NL.I1UK1 petersfield,
VV/I\VI\/ HANTS GU32 2JG
0730 68521 TELEX 88626 MYNEWS G
Tes Sir Clive
this is the QL
Hot Line../
0730 68521
For all your QL
interface problems
Why drive yourself mad trying to get top quality
print-out from your QL - calm down and ring us.
We can interface your QL to any popular printer.
If you need a printer we can supply one,
delivered tomorrow, at a price you can't beat!
Your Hotline for
all interface problems
If it's printers or interfaces we can help. We can
supply interfaces for all types of computers
including: ATARI. NEW BRAIN. IBM, ADVANCE.
VIC 20, MEMOTECH. SINCLAIR QL. SPECTRUM.
AMSTRAD. COMMODORE 64. ORIC, OSBORNE.
ACORN ELECTRON. SAGE. MACINTOSH.
DRAGON. TEXAS INSTRUMENTS. APRICOT, PET.
TANDY, APPLE. SHARP. BBC. SANYO, ETC
2E !!?
Orders can be phoned for
most major credit cards.
Mail orders with Banker's
Orders; Postal Orders; Building Society Cheques despatched
same day. 24 hour nationwide delivery by Securicor £9.50 +vat.
All orders covered by The Mail Order Protection Scheme.
L
Oni/I ||/\ 12 HIGH STREET,
SLKUK) PETERSFIELD,
V/V/I\UI\; HANTS GU32 2JG
0730 68521 TELEX 88626 MYNEWS G
PERSONAL CALLERS WELCOME SEVEN
DAYS A WEEK - JUST OFF THE A3
K
PERSONAL CALLERS WELCOME SEVEN
DAYS A WEEK - JUST OFF THE A3
1
PCW25
The Qume SPRINT 11 PLUS daisywheel
printer from ISG Data Sales is the most
versatile and reliable printer on the
market. With its Qume Connection,,,,
interface module, it is plug-compatible
with the IBM PC, TRS-80, Hewlett-
Packard, Xerox, and many other personal
and small business computers.
The SPRINT 11 PLUS family features
unsurpassed, letter-perfect printing at 40
or 55 characters per second, and offers
over 100 different printwheels in a wide
variety of typestyles.
Best of all, you can have the SPRINT 11
PLUS, complete with interface module,
for hundreds of £££’s less than its
nearest competitors. That makes this
printer the best price/performance value
in the industry.
So if you re ready for the best printer
you can buy — and the best buy in printers
— cal! ISG Data Sales today.Think of
us as your best connection for Qume.
Sales hot line (0734) 884866
DEALER & OEM ENQUIRIES WELCOME
Make the Qume
Connection at
Data Sates Ltd
Qume’s
SPRINT 11 PLUS™
family of printers fits
every microcomputer.
ISG Data Sales Ltd.,
UnitS, Wellington Industrial Estate,
Basingstoke Road, Spencers Wood,
Reading RG7 IAW
Tel. Reading (0734) 884666
Qume [uk]
^ AUTHORISED
-SEfiSro
& SERVICE AGENT
26PCW
Do it your way
So often, the solution
to a problem you're facing
requires a combination of
spreadsheet analysis,
word processing, database
management graphics
and that vital ingredient
- ideas processing. What
you really need is a
program that thinks like
you do. Framework.™
Perhaps you've looked at or tried 'integrated'
or suites of programs - bells, whistles and all.
Mind-bending.
Now, you're ready for Framework, from the
Company that brought you
dBASEII. You'll think it can read
your mind. Framework will
solve your problems the way you
want to, not the way other
software makes you.
With one set of keystrokes and
commands, you'll be able to do all your work in
Framework. And with one learning curve, not
six, you will be able to provide complete
solutions from the moment you power-up.
Framework will read data from
dBASEII; dBASEIII; Lotus 1, 2, 3;
Wordstar and a wide range
of other packages.
Framework runs on the IBM PC
and 100% compatibles, and is
available soon on MS-DOS.
\
1
All things
considered.
ASHTON -TATEB
Supported by: Ashton-Tate (UK) Limited,
Cofferidge Close, Stony Stratford, MK11 1BY.
CALL: 0908 568866
Framework is a registered trademark
of Ashton-Tate. ©Ashton Tate 1983
PCW27
'.ft.
I
I THE 1 ALAPPnT 8‘ CAVE OF COMPUTER AHP BLBCTBOMIC EQUIPMENT
4)
, ~f
3 disk drives
HARD DISK DRIVES
^ully refurbished DIABLO/DRE senes 30 2 5 Mb disk
DEC RKOS, NOVA, TEXAS compatible
Front load. Free stand or rack mount £550 00
Exchangeable type (via lid removal) £295 00
m«3029 PSU unit tor 2 drives £125 00
DIABLO/DRE 44-4000A/B 5 + 5 ex stock from £995 00 \
1000 s of spares for S30, 4000. 3200. HAWK ex stock
Plus in house repair, refurbishing service
_Call for details or quotation_
EX STOCK INTEGRATED CIRCUITS
D8085AH-2 D8086 D8257-5
D8202 D8271 AM2764-3DC
74LS86 74LS112 74LS373
7407 2102-6 4116-3
CALL SALES OFFICE FOR PRICES
SAVE
hoi um MTA Mtt
DISTEL©
THE ORIGINAL FREE OF CHARGE dial up data base
1000's of stock items and one off bargains
ON LINE NOW-300 baud, full duplex CCITTlPQes. 8 bit
word, no parity
COMPUTER ‘CAB
baud, full duplex CCITT tones
01-679 ItSS
MAINS fit TfftS
C ure those unnerving hang ups and data glitches caused
by mams interference
SD5A As recommended by ZX81 newsletter matchbox
size up to 1000 watt load £5 95
L2127 compact completely cased unit with 3 pm fitted
socket Up to 750 watts £9.99
COOLING FANS
| Keep your hot parts COOL and RELIABLE
| with our range of BRAND NEW professional
I cooling fans.
I ETRI 99XUOI Dim 92 x 92 x 25 mm
1 Miniature 240 v equipment fan complete with
I Nnger guard. £9.95.
| GOULD JB-3AR Dim 3" x 3" x 2 5” compact
] ^ery quiet running 240 v operation NEW £6.95/
| BUHLER 69.11.22. 8-16 v DC micro
I miniature reversible fan. Uses a brushless
I servo motor for extremely high air flow.
I almost silent running and guaranteed 10.000
I hr life Measures only 62 x 62 x 22 mm
I Current cost C32 00 OUR PRICE ONLY
I £12.95 complete with data.
I MUFFIN-CENTAUR standard 4 x 4 x 1.25”
| tan supplied tested EX EQUIPMENT 240 v at
I £6.25 or 110vatC4 95 or BRAND NEW 240 v
t C10 50 1000's of other fans Ex Stock
II for Details. Post & Packing on all fans £1
r TRANSTEL PRINTERS
C NEWS SERVICE compact, quality built
>0 column matrix printer. Standard 5 bit
! erial, BAUDOT CODE current loop inter¬
face for connection to computer or radio
| receiver via simple filter network to decode
ind print most world-wide NEWS. TELEX
ind RTTY services Supplied tested and in
jood condition with data large paper roll
md 50 and 75 baud xtals. ONLY £49.95
~ rr. £6.00
©
£250 SUK * PRINTER ^OOP
ctHnONICS 739-2
WL The “Do Everything Printer*'at a price tt
&
fcl 1 * 9
The “Do Everything Printer*' at a price that will
NEVER be repeated Standard CENTRONICS
parallel interface for direct connection to BBC,
ORIC, DRAGON etc Superb pnnt quality with full
pm addressable graphics and 4 type fonts plus
HIGH DEFINITION internal PROPORTIONAL SPACED
MODE for WORD PROCESSOR applications 80-132
columns, single sheet, sprocket or roll paper handling plus
much more Available ONLY from DISPLAY r ELECTRONICS
at the ridiculous price of OBIT£199.00 + VAT Complete with
full manual etc Limited quantity -Hurry while stocks last
Options Interface cable (specify) for BBC, ORIC,
DRAGON or CENTRONICS 36 way pig £ 12 50 Spare nbbon
^ C3 00 each BBC graphics screen dump utility program £860
Carnage and Ins £ 1Q 00 + VAT
TELETYPE ASR 33
DATA I/O TERMINALS
Industry standard combined ASCII 110
baud printer, keyboard and 8 hole paper
tape punch and reader. Standard RS232
serial interface. Ideal as cheap hard copy
unit or tape prep, for CNC and NC
machines TESTED and in good condition.
Only£235. 00 floor stand 10.00
Carr& Ins £15.00
GE TERMIPRINTER TDUAL 5” DISK DRIVES^
A massive purchase of these desk top
printer -terminals enables us to offer you
these quality 30 cps printers at a SUPER
LOW PRICE against their original cost of
over £ 1000 Unit comprises of full QWERTY,
electronic keyboard and pnnter mech with
pnnt face similar to correspondence quality
typewriter Variable forms tractor unit
enables full width - up to 13.5” 120 column
paper, upper - lower case, standard RS232
serial interface, internal vertical and
horizontal tab settings, standard ribbon
adjustable baud rates quiet operation plus
many other features Supplieo complete
with manual Guaranteed working £150 00 or
untested £15.00. optional floor stand C12 50
Carr & Ins £10.00
PROFESSIONAL KEYBOARD OFFER
An advantageous purchase of brand new surplus allows
chassis keyboard offer at fractions of their onginal costs
Current, quality, professional product of a
major computer company, comprising
2 x 40 track MPI or Shugart FULLY BBC
COMPATIBLE single sided drives in a
compact, attractively styled, grey ABS
structured case with internal switched
mode PSU The PSU was intended to drive
both drives and an intelligent Z80 controller
with over 70 ic's. The controller has been
removed leaving ample space and current
on the -F, -5. +12 and -12 supply for all
your future expansion requirements.
Supplied tested with 90 day guarantee in
BRAND NEW condition with cable for BB<
micro Ex Stock at only £259.00
+ C 1_p.00 carr. Limited Quantity Only
All in one quality computer
cabinet with integral switched
mode PSU, Mains filtering, and twin fan cooling.
Originally made for the famous DEC PDP8 computer
system costing thousands of pounds Made to run 24
hours per day the PSU is fully screened and will deliver a
massive +5v DC at 17 amps. +1 5v DC at 1 amp and -1 5v
DC at 5 amps The complete unit is fully enc osed with
removable top lid, filtering, trip switch. Power* and Run'
LEDs mounted on All front panel, rear cable entries etc
etc Units are in good but used condition - s jpplied for
240v operation complete with full circuit and tech man
Give your system that professional finish for only
C49 95 + Carr D m. 19" wide 16" deep 10.5" high
Useable area I6"w 10.5"h 11 5"d.
I Also available LESS PSU with FANS etc. Internal dim
L! 9"w 16”d. 10.5"h El 9.95 Carriagfe & insurance £9.50
BUDGET RANGE
VIDEO MONITORS
At a price YOU can afford, our range of EX
EQUIPMENT video monitors defy
competition!! All are for 240v working with
standard composite video input. Units are
pre tested and set for up to 80 col use on
BBC micro Even where MINOR screen
burns MAY exist - normal data displays are
unaHeC,ed 1000 s SOLO TO DATE
9” HITACHI very compact fully cased, dim.
21 cm H x 21 cm W x 22cm D Black and
white screen £44. 95
1 2” KGM 320-321, high bandwidth input,
will display up to 132 columns x 25 lines.
Housed in attractive fully enclosed
brushed alloy case. B/W only £J2.95
GREEN screen£J9.95
24” KGM large screen black & white
monitor fully enclosed in light alloy case.
^N^Y^^^bo hops ’ c,u ^ s elc
14” BRAND NEW Novex COLOUR type
NCI 414-CL. Many exacting features such
as RGB TTL and composite video input,
GREEN TEXT key. internal speaker and
audio amp. Even finished in BBC micro
mj^tch mc^ ^oloims. Fully guaranteed.
Carriage and ins on ALL videos £10.00
CALL
DATA MODEMS
| Join the communications revolution with our
range of EX TELECOM data modems Made to
most stringent spec and designed to operate
I tor 24 hrs per day Units are made to the
I CCITT'tone spec With RS232 i/o levels via
I .I 25 way D skt Units are sold in a tested
I and working condition with data Permission
j may be required for connection to PO lines
MODEM 2B "Hackers Special" fully fledged
up to 300 baud full duplex, ANSWER or Ci
modes AUTO ANSWER. Data i/o via
standard RS232 25 way D' socket Just 2 wire
I connection to comms line Ideal networks etc
Complete with data tested, ready to run at a
NEW SUPER LOW PRICE of ONLY£05 00 l
[ VAT + Carr.
MODEM 20-1 Compact unit tor use with
MICRONET. PRESTEL or TELECOM GOLD
etc 2 wire direct connect 75 baud transmit
1200 baud receive Data i/o via RS232 D
socket Guaranteed working with data £99 95
MODEM 20-2 same as 20-1 but 75 baud
receive 1200 baud transmit £130 00
TRANSDATA 307A 300 baud acoustic
coupler RS232 i/o £95.00
NEW DSL2123 Multi Standard modem
selectable V21 300-300 bps. V23 75-1200,
V23 1200-75 full duplex Or 1200-1200 half
duplex modes. Full auto answer via modem or
CPU LED status indicators CALL or ANS
modes Switchable CCrTT or BELL 103 &
202 Housed in ABS case size only 2.5" x 8.5”
x 9" £286.00 + VAT
For further data or details on other EX STOCK
^modems contact sales office.
Carriage on all modems £10.00 + VAT.
i great QWERTY, full travel.
chassis keyboard offer at fractions of their original costs
ALPHAMERIC 7204/60 full ASCII 60 key, upper, lower + control key. parallel TTL
output plus strobe Dim 12" x 6” +5 & -12 DC £39.50
DEC LA34 Uncoded keyboard with 67 quality, GOLD, normally open switches on
standard X, Y matrix. Complete with 3 LED indicators & i/o cable - ideal micro
conversions etc pcb DIM 15" x 4 5"£74.15 Carriage on keyboards £3 00 _ —
THE BENEFITS OF INSURANCE
Almost four months ago, on the 29th of February 1984, we, DISPLAY
ELECTRONICS were unfortunate enough to have a serious fire at our main
location, reducing a substantial part of our stock, warehouse and offices to a pile of
ashes and rubble. HOWEVER, we had seen the adverts about the "Benefits of
Insurance” and some years ago had taken comprehensive insurance cover to
protect against an event such as this.
The day after the fire we did not even have a single pen to write with, to say nothing
of the non existant showroom and burnt out warehouse with direct access to the
stars via our now non existant roof!!
The loss of stock and damage to the premises has resulted in losses in excess of
£400,000 pounds in real money - no price can value time and effort.
We are still, although working under great difficulties, VERY MUCH in business.
We owe this to supreme efforts by all our staff - perhaps knowing their jobs could
have been at stake, stock being located at several different locations, help from
business colleagues and our bank
To these people, I say a very loud THANK YOU.
To both the mighty PRUDENTIAL and GENERAL ACCIDENT Insurance
Companies who from the date of our fire have NOT even offered or paid A SINGLE
PENNY in compensation or have not even offered an ounce of moral support ..
To both the mighty PRUDENTIAL and GENERAL ACCIDENT Insurance
Companies who only answer our requests for help and information with "We are
still looking at reports .” | say “STRONG STUFF THIS INSURANCE????”
David Fisher, Managing Director, DISPLAY ELECTRONICS^
ELECTRONIC
COMPONENTS
EQUIPMENT
Due to our massive bulk purchasing programme which enables us to bring you the best possible
bargains, we have thousands of 1C s. Transistors. Relays. Caps. PC 8 s. Sub-assemblies.
Switches, etc etc surplus to our requirements Because we don t have sufficient stocks of any
one item to include in our ads we are packing all these items into the BARGAIN PARC ELJDF A
LIFETIME Thousands of components at giveaway prices' Guaranteed to be worth
at least 3 times what you pay Unbeatable value" Sold by weight
2 5kls £4.25 + pp Cl 25 5kls £5.90 + £1 80
10kls£/0.25 + pp £2 25 20 kls £17.50 + £4 75
66% DISCOUNT
.'IbFLli T
J^ALL PRICES PLUS VAT
SEMICONDUCTOR
‘GRAB RAGS’
Mixed Semis amazing value contents
include transistors, digital, linear. I.C 's triacs I
diodes, bridge recs. etc etc All devices
guaranteed brand new full spec with manu¬
facturer's markings, fully guaranteed.
50+£7.95 100+£5/5.
TTL 74 Series A gigantic purchase of an
"across the board" range of 74 TTL series
I.C.s enables us to offer 100+ mixed
"mostly TTL" grab bags at a price which two
or three chips m the bag would nnormally
cost to buy Fully guaranteed all 1C s full
spec 100+ £4 90 200 + £/7. J0 300+ £/9.50
EX STOCK
DEC CORNER
BA11 -MB 3.5" Bax, PSU. LTC £385.00
DH11-AD 16 x RS232 DMA
interface £2100.00
DLV11 - J 4 x EIA interface £310.00
DUP11 Sych Serial data i/o £650.00
DZ11-B 8 line RS232 mux board £650.00
LA36 Decwriter EIA or 20 ma loop £270.00
LAXX-NW LAI 80 RS232 serial interface
and buffer option £130.00
LAX34-AL LA34 tractor feed £85.00
MS11 -JP Unibus 32 kb Ram £80.00
MS11-LB Unibus 128 kb Ram £450.00
MSI 1-LD Unibus 256 kb Ram £850.00
MSC4804 Qbus (Equiv MSV11-L)
256 kb £499.00
PDP11 /05 Cpu, Ram, i/o, etc. £450.00
PDP11 /40 Cpu, 1 24k MMU £1850.00
RT11 ver. 3B documentation kit £70.00
RK05-J 2.5 Mb disk drives £650.00
KL8JA PDP8 async i/o £175.00
MI8E PDP 8 Bootstrap option £75.00
VT50 VDU and Keyboard -
current loop £175.00
1000 s of EX STOCK spares for DEC
PDP8, PDP8A, PD P11 systems &
peripherals. Call for details. All types of
Computer equipment and spares wanted
for PROMPT CASH PAYMENT.
I All pnces quoted are for U.K. Mainland, paid cash with order in Pounds Stirling PLUS VAT Minimum order value£7. 00. Minimum Credit I
Card order£ 10.00 Minimum BONA FIDE account orders from Government depts^ Schools, Universities and established companies |
‘ 0.00 Where post and packing not indicated please ADD £1.00. + VAT Warehouse open Mon-Fn 9.30 - 5.30. Sat. 10.15 - f
s reserve the right to change pnces and specifications without notice. Trade, Bulk and Export enquiries welcome
, O C l T o ll NI rc 32 Biggin Way, Upper Norwood, London SE19 3XF
LLLL I l\ Ul IILJ Telephone 01 -679 4414 Telex 27924
With over a billion
records per database,
dBASE III is the
database management
system for the 16/32
bit generation of
computers.
Rich with Features
- Over a billion records per database only
limited by the hardware configuration.
- 128 fields per record.
- Variable length text fields
(up to 4k bytes per entry).
- 4,000 bytes per record (fixed length).
- 10 database files in use simultaneously.
- faster operation - sorting, indexing and
other file operations.
- 15.9 digits of numerical precision.
The Command Assistant offers
a complete "hand-holding" guide
| for the new user. And, as commands
become more familiar, the guide can be
put aside, to gain maximum speed
Experienced dBASE users may bypass
this facility.
Existing dBASE II users can take the
upgrade path to dBASE III. A conversion
program is supplied to transfer data created
in dBASE II, which will
also assist in converting A gSilR
applications programs.
dBASE III runs on SjSSEGgfijsi j
IBM PC's with 256k HHHUE
RAM and 100%
compatibles.
dBASE II dominates __
the 8 bit market NOW... I
Big Brother has
arrived
ASHTON TATE ■
Ashton-Tate (UK) Limited,
Cofferidge Close, Stony Stratford, MK11 1BY.
CALL: 0908 568866
dBASE II and dBASE III are registered trademarks
of Ashton Tate. © Ashton Tate 1983/4
PCW29
sssgSli
The Grappler offers a complete answer to printer
interfacing, with many capabilities unique in the
Commodore market place. Complete signal
transmission allows many popular name brand
printers to operate perfectly with the Commodore
64. Even Commodore's graphic character set can
be reproduced on Epson, Star, Oki, Brother,
Prowriter and other popular printers.
• Prints screen graphics without software
• Graphics screen dump routines include rotated,
inversed, enhanced, and double sized graphics
• Complete emulation of the 1525 printer for
printing Commodore's special characters
• Text screen dump and formatting commands
• 22 unique text and graphics commands
If you don't own a
Commodore, but need
an interface...
We have interlaces and cables for all types of
computers including: ATARI, NEW BRAIN, IBM,
ADVANCE, VIC 20, MEMOTECH. SINCLAIR QL.
SPECTRUM, AMSTRAND. SAGE. DRAGON, PET.
TANDY, TEXAS INSTRUMENTS, APRICOT. APPLE,
SHARP, MACINTOSH. BBC, SANYO, OSBORNE.
~i 24 hour nationwide delivery by
Securicor £9.50 + vat. Bankers
Orders; Building Society
Cheques; Postal Orders; - same day despatch. All orders covered by
the Mail Order Protection Scheme.
SCI(UK)
0730 68521
FREEPOST
PETERSFIELD
HANTS GU32 2BR
TELEX 86626 MYNEWS G
PERSONAL CALLERS WELCOME AT OUR
MAGNIFICENT NEW SHOWROOMS AT
12 HIGH ST., PETERSFIELD, HANTS
The Comp
NEW! Interface
ete Printer
or the
Commodore 64
The Grappler gives you the print out you need from Epson, Star, Oki,
Brother, Prowriter and other popular printers. Graphics screen dumps
including inversed, double-sized, rotated/enhanced
graphics with special features P4 flO flfl +VAT=
for Epson FX and RX printers. L I UZ.UU £117.30
DAISY STEP 2000
£249.00 £286.35
+ VAT =
18cps; Bi-directional logic seeking; 10, 12, 15cps; Wordstar
compatible; 1 3 inch platen; 1 2 inch print line; auto underscore; bold
and shadow printing; subscripts and superscripts; Qume compatible
daisy ribbons; Qume compatible daisy wheel; optional tractor and
sheet feeder; optional RS 232C; serial interface; low noise; low cost;
high reliability Qon't accept anything less
WHEELS ★ CABLES ★ INTERFACES ★ PAPER ★
TABLES ★ DAISY WHEELS ★ CABLES ★
INTERFACES ★ PAPER ★ TABLES
WHEELS ★ CABLES ★ I NTE£
TABLES ★
INTERF
L ★ PAPER ★
Reels ★ cables ★
★ PAPER ★ TABLES ★ DAISY
RTELS ★ CABLES ★ INTERFACES ★ PAPER ★
TABLES * DAISY WHEELS * CABLES
ADMATE DP-80
+ VAT=
£169.00 £194.50
The Admate DP-80 has a large range of features and a low price.
Ideal for the first time user. 80 CPS; 80 column; Bi-directional logic
seeking; block and dot addressable graphics; sub/superscript, auto
underline, condensed, emphasised, expanded and italic print.
24 hour nationwide delivery by
Securicor £9.50 +vat. Bankers
Orders; Building Society
Cheques; Postal Orders; - same day despatch. All orders covered by
the Mail Order Protection Scheme.
a
SCI(UK) petIrsfield
W ATjncocoi HANTS GU32 2BR
0730 68521 TELEX 86626 MYNEWS G
n
PERSONAL CALLERS WELCOME AT OUR
MAGNIFICENT NEW SHOWROOMS AT
12 HIGH ST., PETERSHELD, HANTS
5
30PCW
OMNI K IOI>\N
il'WIM lOMOKKUW!
24 IIUI l< m
SCI(UK) SETTING NEW STANDARDS
IN CUSTOMER SERVICE
OMDI H IU|>\\
PRIM IOMOKKONN!
24 lltll K 1)1 I INI H\
0730 68521 ANY DAY INCLUDING SUNDAY
EPSON LOW PRICE SPECIALS FROM £199
imihi i.iiiA
EPSON RX80 (DOT MATRIX).... . p49 £1!
EPSON RX80FT (DOT MATRIX). . . . .... £?8$ £239
EPSON FX80 (DOT MATRIX).... . £#& £324
EPSON MX 100 (DOT MATRIX). . . . .... £*?$ £365
EPSON RX100 (DOT MATRIX). . . . .... £45<r £385
EPSON FX100 (DOT MATRIX).... . £5<s$ £499
NEWICanonp
£269.
+ VAT= £309.35
80 cols; High speed printing, 160 CPS; bi-directional
Jogic seeking; fantastic 27 CPS near letter quality; 23 x
11 8 matrix; very quiet - less than 60 dB; 4, 5, 6, 8 10,
12,17 CPI; down loading for user-optional characters;
high resolution graphics; handles various forms, roll
paper, fan fold, single sheet and multipart copy paper.
ALSO AVAILABLE^THE CANON PW1156A as above but 156 cols £369.00 £424*35
PHONE 0730 68521 SEVEN DAYS A WEEK
JUKI 6100 just £349
+ VAT=
£401.35
SHINWA CP80 £179.00
+ VAT =
£205.58
20CPS: Bidirectional 8- Logic
10, 12, 15 8 Proportional
Spacing; Wordstar compatable
2K Buffer; 1 3 inch Platen
Underline; backspace 8 lots more
Centronics Interface Standard
OPTIONAL RS232
TRACTOR AND
SHEET FEEDER
Friction and tractor feed as
standard. 80cps.
Bi-directional logic seeking
13x9 dot matrix giving true
descenders, sub and superscripts
Italic printing and auto underlining
Condensed, emphasised,
expanded and double strike (can
be mixed in a line). Parallel
interface fitted as standard
WE WILL MATCH ANY GENUINE PRICE ADVERTISED
SCKUK) IS NEVER BEATEN ON PRICE
MANY MORE
PRINTERS
AVAILABLE
1,000s OF
BARGAINS
SEND NOW FOR THE
FAMOUS SCKUK)
CATALOGUE
FIDELITY 14” COLOUR
MONITOR &
COMPOSITE VIDEO
£189.00
0
“J
Orders can be phoned for major credit cards. Banker's Orders; Postal
Orders; Building Society Cheques despatched same day. 24 hour
nationwide delivery by Securicor £9.50 + vat. All orders covered by
the Mail Order Protection Scheme. Nationwide maintenance
contracts arranged. Educational discounts very welcome.
We can supply interfaces for all types
of computers including: ATARI, NEW
BRAIN, IBM, ADVANCE, VIC 20,
MEMOTECH, SINCLAIR QL,
SPECTRUM, AMSTRAD,
COMMODORE 64, ORIC,
OSBORNE, SAGE,
ACORN ELECTRON,
MACINTOSH, DRAGON,
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS,
APRICOT, PET,
TANDY, APPLE,
SHARP, BBC,
SANYO, ETC
Of*III ||f\ PETERSFIELD^ 1, DEALER ENQUIRIES
dv/l(UI\) HANTS GU32 2JG S& dptails™ 16
0730 68521 TELEX 88626 MYNEWS G DETAILS
PERSONAL CALLERS WELCOME FOR DEMONSTRATIONS
ANY DAY AT OUR SHOWROOMS - JUST OFF THE A3
Apple taught Macintosh about
man. Now man wants
Macintosh
Introducing Macintosh
Macintosh’s brain is the same
blindingly-fast 32 bit MC68000
micro-processor that powers the
Lisa personal computer.
Its heart is the same Lisa
technology of windows, pull-down
menus, mouse commands and
icons. All of which
make that 32-bit
power more
useful by making
Macintosh far easier
to use.
Now for some small talk
If the problem won’t come to
Macintosh, you can always take
Macintosh to the problem - it
weighs 9 pounds less than the
most popular portable computer.
Just pick Macintosh up by its
built-in handle, and carry it.
A miracle of miniaturisation is
Macintosh’s built-in 3/2” drive.
Its discs store 400K - more than
conventional 514” floppies.
Programmes
There are already plenty of
remarkable programmes available
to keep Macintosh busy. Like
MacPaint a programme that, for
the first time, lets a personal
Macintosh automatically makes
room for illustrations in text.
MacPaint - virtually any image
the human hand can create.
Microsoft’s Multiplan for
Macintosh.
computer produce virtually any
image that the hand can create.
There’s more software on the
way from developers like
Microsoft, Lotus and Software
Publishing, to mention a few. And
with Macintosh BASIC,
Macintosh PASCAL and our own
Macintosh Toolbox for writing
your own mouse driven
programmes, you could turn a few
bob in your spare time.
All the right connections
On the back of the machine,
you’ll find built-in RS232 and
RS422 Applebus serial
communication ports for
connecting printers, modems, and
other peripherals without adding
expensive cards. If you wish to
double Macintosh’s storage with
an external disc drive, you don’t
have to pay for a disc controller
card - that’s built in too.
Talking of extras
Macintosh has a built-in
polyphonic sound generator
capable of producing high-quality
speech and music.
We wish to acknowledge the several well known trade
marks used in this advertisement.
PHONE FOR A QUOTE - 0730 68521 - ANYTIME
£269
MANY MORE
PRINTERS
AVAILABLE
1,000s OF
BARGAINS
SEND NOW FOR THE
FAMOUS SCI(UK)
CATALOGUE
ORDER I'ODAt
PRIM IOMORROW!
24 HOI R DEI.IX I in
Canon
+ VAT= £309.35
We have interfaces and cables for
all types of computers including:
ATARI, NEW BRAIN,
ADVANCE, AMSTRAND,
MEMOTECH, SINCLAIR QL,
SPECTRUM, VIC 20, SAGE,
DRAGON, TANDY,
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS,
IBM, APRICOT,
APPLE, MACINTOSH,
PET, SHARP, BBC,
SANYO, OSBORNE.
24 hour nationwide delivery by Securicor £9.50 + vat. Bankers Orders;
Building Society Cheques; Postal Orders; ■ same day despatch. All
orders covered by the Mail Order Protection Scheme. Nationwide
Ml maintenance contracts arranged. Educational discounts very welcome.
SCI(UK)
0730 68521
FREEPOST
PETERSFIELD
HANTS GU32 2BR
TELEX 86626 MYNEWS G
DEALER ENQUIRIES
WELCOME WRITE
FOR DETAILS
MACINTOSH AND PRINTER DEMONSTRATIONS DAILY AT
OUR SHOWROOMS AT 12 HIGH ST., PETERSFIELD, HANTS
32PCW
INTEREST FREE FINANCE!
OVER 12 or 24 MONTHS
ON THE
e.g.
IBM PC = £1988
+ 24 (months)
£82.83 per month
+
OLIVETTI PC
The totally IBM compatible M24. Full system with 128K — £1889
From From From
£1795 or £9.99pw*£1795 or £9.99pw* £2195 or £11.99pw*
IBM PC
The world's leading business computer — £1988
From From
£2195 or £11.99pw*£1095 or £5.99pw*
Macintosh apricot CO/nPAQ. 9^ sinus i
1 THE PORTABLE IBM
COMPATABLE COMPUTER
OFFICE EFFICIENCY MACHINES, THE LONDON MICROCENTRE
OFFERS YOU TOTAL FLEXIBILITY AND SUPPORT INCLUDING:-
PURCHASE - EX STOCK! * (volume purchase agreements available at competitive rates)
INTEREST FREE CREDIT* (arranged on most computers over £2000*)
TRADE IN ANY MICRO against a new machine*
TR A I |V| | MP (REGULAR COURSES ON IBIVi PC DISPLAYWRITER, LOTUS 123, INTRODUCTION TO MICRO'S,
I nMIIMlIMVJ OPERATING SYSTEMS, SPREADSHEETS, DATABASES, WORDPROCESSING, etc
ALSO ADVANCED MICRO COURSES )
BARGAINS — CALL ON FRIDAYS FOR QUOTE ON 1 WEEK OLD SHOWROOM MODELS
RENTALS (1 day to 2 years)
LEASING (2 years to 6 years)
ON SITE MAINTENANCE
Call in at our West London Showrooms to arrange a
cemonstration on 0V741 7381
or to place your order
call our hotline on 0V748 8404
* Based on 5 years and subject to status & conditions
To: OFFICE EFFICIENCY MACHINES LTD.
150-152 King Street, Hammersmith,
London W.6. Tel. 741 7383/4/5/6
Please send me information/quote on
□ Please ask your sales staff to contact me CD Urgent
I have a requirement for CD 1 system □ 2-9 systems
CD 10 or more systems
I will be purchasing within
("I 1 week CD 1 month Q 3 months or more
My budget is £ .
Name _Title -
Company__
Address____ _
Postcode_
Phone_Extension _
\
\ KEMP
\ ^ V STATE OF THE ART' design with the
★ Compatible with Kempston Joystick software (the industry standard).
Compatible with Sinclair/Psion software.
~ » V ★ Compatible with cursor key software.
Compatible with ROM cartridge and cassette software.
*
★ Three 9 way D plugs for our
X V Competition Pro range or standard
Atari type joysticks.
Price includes VAT, p & p.
\ HEmpbTon
^ ^ MICRO" ELECTRONICS LTD
Unit 30 Singer Way,
^ ^ Woburn Road Industrial Estate,
Kempston, Bedford, MK42 7AF
^ Tel: (0234) 856633
% Telex: 826078 KEMPMIG
\
Microware announces
a new concept in IBM sales:
The immediately available PC.
If you’ve wasted a lot of time lately ringing IBM dealers
only to find they cannot give you a delivery d ate, try us!
We will:
Provide the widest range of software support.
Offer comprehensive maintenance contracts.
Thke pride in our unparalleled after-sales service
Analyse and identify your requirements.
Advise on your system needs.
Supply and install your equipment.
- Newsflash -
Pegasus Links to
Multiplan 6? Delta
with
report generator.
m
SOFTWARE
DATABASE PACKAGES
• dBASElll <£475.00
• DMS-<£195.00
• Delta-£495.00
• Everyman- £475.00
• Knowledge Man-£350.00
WORD PROCESSORS
• WordStar-£245.00
• Microsoft Word/Mouse-£340.00
• Multimate-£340.00
• Wordcraft - £34 0.00
• Word Perfect-£425.00
HARDWARE
MULTI-USER PEGASUS £295.00
•Sales Ledger
• Purchase Ledger
• Nominal Ledger
• Invoicing
• Order Processing
• Stock Control
• Payroll
• Job Costing
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
• Hornet-£2750.00
• Harvard-£395.00
NEW LOTUS SYMPHONY £495.00
• New Lotus 123 Upgrade
• Spreadsheet
• Graphics
• Database
• Communications
• Word Processing
LOTUS 123-£375.00
FRAMEWORK £475.00
VARIOUS SELECTION
• PC TUtor 2.0-£41.00
• CBasic-£140.00
• Pascal/MT+ £420.00
• Microsoft‘C’ £384.00
• Chess-£61.00
• Norton Utilities-£56.00
• Backgammon- £35.00
• Electronic Disk-£50.00
• Copy II pc-£29.00
• Display writer II £245.00
TELEX LINK
• Send telexes from IBM PC-
£1350.00
ARABIC IBM PC
• Conversion to Arabic-£590.00
• Arab Word Processor-£595.00
PRINTERS FROM £250.00
• Epson FX-80/FX-100/ LQ1500
• Brother HR15/HR25
• NEC Spinwriter
• Sheet Feeders Available
• Typeface Catalogue Available
• Acoustic Hoods from £295.00
THE PROFESSIONALS
• Full training provided
• Free 12 months warranty
• Leasing deals arranged
• Highly competitive quotations
• Long and short term rentals
BASIC SYSTEM
• IBM Personal Computer
64K RAM. Single sided Disk
Drive
Keyboard, Screen-£1567.00
• IBM Personal Computer
128K RAM. Twin 360K Drives
Keyboard, Screen-£2087.00
BUSINESS SYSTEM
• IBM Personal Computer
256K RAM. Twin 360K Drives.
Keyboard, Screen-£2299.00
HARD DISK SYSTEM
• IBM Personal Computer
128K RAM. 10Mbyte Hard Disk.
Single 360K Floppy Drive
Keyboard. Screen-£4078.00
HERCULES GRAPHICS CARD
• Additional Cost only £215.00
COLOUR SYSTEMS
• Additional Cost only £405.00
I’crsmml
Cnwfmtir
IBM Authorised Dealer
_ BUSINESS SYSTEMS
637 Holloway Road London N19 5SS 01-263 1124 Telex 297598
14 Charles Street Hanley Stoke-on-Trent 269 883
Economical all-purpose printing for your computer
o Centronics-compatible parallel interface.
o Bidirectional logical seek operation for high-speed printing (120 cps).
o Output to printer can be on character-by-character or even dot-by-dot basis,
o Many character sizes; fan-fold and single-sheet paper.
0 Automatic reversal of ribbon gives clear, crisp impressions for a long period of time.
Here is the opportunity to obtain a dot matrix printer of proven quality and superb performance at
an unbeatable price.
From the manufacturers of the renowned Spinwriter and Pinwriter printers, NEC's 8023-N must
represent the best buy of 1984. Recently selling at prices up to £399, the special offer price allows
personal computer users the luxury of a quality printer at a budget price, and the business system user to
enjoy a rare bargain.
Available ex-stock or contact us for details of your nearest dealer.
SPECIFICATION
PRINT FUNCTIONS
Print Method: Impact dot-matrix; Bidirectional logical seek print
Print Speeds: 120 cps (10-pitch spacing)
Print Format: 7 (horizontal) x 9 (vertical): alphanumericsand
symbols; 8 (horizontal) x 8 (vertical): dot-image graphics
Character Sets: ASCII - 96; JIS — 160; Graphic/Character - 64
Carriage Return Direction: Forward and backwards
Carriage Return Spacing: 1/6 inch, 1/8 inch; programmable at
every 1/144 inch
PAPER
Width: 4.5 inch to 10 inch
Thickness: 0-05 mm to 0.28 mm
Number of Copies: Original + 3 copies (should not exceed the
above width or thickness limits
Form: Fan-fold paper; single-sheet
Trade Enquiries contact Mick Barton.
PAPER FEED
Feed: Friction feed, sprocket pin feed
Direction: Up and Backward
Drive Method: Stepping Motor
INK RIBBON: Special ribbon cartridge (black)
DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHT
Dimensions: 398 (W) x 285 (D) x 121 (H) mm
Weight: 8.5 kg
INTERFACE: Centronics 8 bit parallel
Max. Line Width
Print Spacing
Remarks
136 characters
17 cpi
Reduced characters
68 characters
8.5 cpi
Reduced and enlarged characters
80 characters
10 cpi
Pica
40 characters
5 cpi
Enlarged pica
96 characters
12 cpi
Elite
48 characters
6 cpi
Enlarged elite
/Mills/lssociates Lid.
Computer Supplies & Peripherals
WILFORD INDUSTRIAL ESTATE
RUDDINGTON LANE
WILFORD
NOTTINGHAM
TEL: (0602) 818222
TELEX: 37134
UNBELIEVABLE
SAVINGS
** COMPUTERS **
EX VAT
APRICOT
256K315Kx2 MONITOR
£1425.00
APRICOT
256K720Kx2 MONITOR
£1625.00
APRICOT
Xi256k5MB MONITOR
£2175.00
APRICOT
Xi 256k 10MB MONITOR
£2295.00
APRICOT
Optional 12in MONITOR
£220.00
CIFER
9000 Multi User21MB
£5095.00
COMMODORE
8250 DISK DRIVE
£785.00
COMMODORE
8296
£695.00
COMMODORE
SX-64 PORTABLE
£675.00
COMMODORE
64
£152.17
COMMODORE
DISK 1541
£165.21
COMMODORE
IBEK PARALLEL INTERFACE £59.50
COMMODORE
1530 C2N CASSETTE
£32.00
COMPAQ
£1895.00
EPSON
QX10
£1600.00
KAYPRO
II
£945.00
KAYPRO
10MB
£1995.00
OLIVETTI
M20160KB 2x320KB Drives £1295.00
OLIVETTI
M24 128KB2x 360KB Drives £1658.00
OLIVETTI
M24 128KB 10MB Hard Disk £3315.00
OSBORNE
1
£1175.00
SAGE
II & IV
POA
SANYO
MBC555 128K2x160K Drives £795.00
SIRIUS
256K10MB
£2850.00
SIRIUS
256K2.4MB
£2095.00
SIRIUS
128K 1.2MB
£1545.00
SIRIUS
Memory Expansions from
£222.00
SIRIUS
Express Accelerator Boards POA
PLUS 5
External Hard Disk Drives
POA
** VDU’s& TERMINALS**
** MATRIX PRINTERS **
EX VAT
ANADEX
DP-6500 500cps
£2019.00
ANADEX
W P-6000
£1808.00
BROTHER
EP44
£199.00
BROTHER
HR5
£129.00
CANON
PW1080A 160cps(NLQ)
£279.00
CANON
PW1156A 160cps(NLQ)
£339.00
EPSON
RX80T lOOcps
RX80F/T lOOcps
£195.00
EPSON
£220.00
EPSON
FX 80160cps
£324.00
EPSON
FX 100F/T I60cps
£430.00
EPSON
HONEYWELL
LQ 1500 200c ps(NLQ)
£895.00
POA
MANNESMANN
MT8080cps
£199.00
MANNESMAN
MT180 160cps(NLQ)
£590.00
NEC
PINWRITER
POA
NEWBURY
DRE 8850 3001pm
£2095.00
NEWBURY
DRE8925240cps
£1385.00
OKI
82A 120cps
£255.00
OKI
84A 200cps
£630.00
OKI
OKI92P 160cps
£379.00
OKI
OKI 2410P350cps
£1535.00
SEIKOSHA
GP100A
£165.00
SHINWA
CP80 Model II FT
£175.00
STAR
DELTA 10 160cps
£329.00
STAR
DELTA 15 160cps
£445.00
STAR
GEMIN110X 120cps
£199.00
STAR
GEMINI 15X120cps
£295.00
STAR
RADIX 10200cps(NLQ)
£449.00
STAR
RADIX 15200cps(NLQ)
£549.00
TEC
1550120cps
£465.00
TOSHIBA
TH2100H 192cps
£1275.00
TREND
930 200cps N LQ 80cps
£1350.00
CIFER T4 £760.00
HAZELTINE ESPRIT Fixed Keyboard £395.00
QUME QVT 103(VT100 VT131) £695.00
TELEVIDEO 910 £489.00
** SOFTWARE**
MAYFAIR
MICROS
ALL MAJOR SOFTWARE PROGRAMS SUPPLIED AT
LOW COST
Plus:
Not only do we offer top quality products at low
prices. We also support and develop Software with
the assistance of our long established software
dept.
BLENHEIM HOUSE, PODMORE ROAD,
LONDON SW18 1AJ
TEL: 01-870 3255
We accept official orders from UK Government and
Educational Establishments. Mail Order and Export
Enquiries welcome. Callers by appointment.
** DAISYWHEEL **
** PRINTERS **
BROTHER
HR1
EX VAT
£445.00
BROTHER
HR15
£329.00
BROTHER
HR15 Keyboard
£135.00
BROTHER
HR15Sheetfeeder
£185.00
BROTHER
HR15Tractor Feed
£62.00
BROTHER
HR25
£549.00
CANON
AP400KSR
£760.00
DAISYSTEP
2000 20cps
£240.00
DIABLO
630 API
£1315.00
DIABLO
Sheet Feeder
£490.00
FUJITSU
SP830 RO(S)80cps
£1195.00
JUKI
610018cps
£325.00
NEC
2010 Serial 20cps
£645.00
NEC
2030 Parallel 20cps
£645.00
NEC
3510Serial 35cps
£1149.00
NEC
3530 Parallel 35cps
£1149.00
NEC
7710Serial 55cps
£1499.00
NEC
7730 Parallel 55cps
£1499.00
OLYMPIA
ESW103
£825.00
QUME
11/40 RO
£1185.00
QUME
1 1/55 RO
£1370.00
QUME
9/45 RO
£1550.00
QUME
9/55 RO
£1900.00
RICOH
RP1300S
£895.00
RICOH
RP1600S
£1190.00
RICOH
RP1600S FLOWRITERSk
£1249.00
RICOH
RP1600S FLOWRITER 8k
IBM PC
£1299.00
RICOH
RP1600S Sheet Feeder
£459.00
RICOH
RP1600S Tractor
£138.00
SILVER REED
SMITH
CORONA
EXP550(P) 16cps
£570.00
TP112cps
£195.00
TEC
STARWRITER F104040cps
£895.00
TEC
STARWRITER FI05555cps £1235.00
TEC
Sheetfeeder
£459.00
TEC
Tractor
£138.00
UCHIDA
DWX-305 (S or P) 18cps
£230.00
* *
PLOTTERS**
MANNESMANN
1 PIXY PLOTTER
£495.00
GOULD
PLOTTER
POA
All of the following software FREE with
every Krypton Micro Computer!
Perfect Writer
The most powerful and versatile word processing software for microcomputers
available anywhere. Features include Virtual Memory, multiple editing up of to 7
files at once, dual display windows, automatic footnotes, table of contents and
indexing.
Perfect Speller
Now, get a 50.000 word dictionary that checks over 4,000 words a minute. It even
locates and corrects documents design errors!
Perfect Calc
You get 17 application programs that are ready to use for any planning and financial
control task. Plus multiple editing of up to 7 files at once and dual display windows.
Perfect Filer
This incredible data base management system produces personalised standard
letters and versatile sort menus for generating lists or invoices. It prints labels,
envelopes and more. It can even handle accounting functions!
This software alone is worth over £1,000.00!!
Prices start from £1,395.00 Ring us NOW on Padgate (0925) 823549.
PCW37
iBBC MICRO
- USER SUPPORT -
„ ^10 ISSUES OF BEEBUG MAGAZINE MAILED FREE TO MEMBERS • 30
EXCITING GAMES AND VISUAL PROGRAMS • 43 SOFTWARE REVIEWS • 33
HARDWARE REVIEWS • 16 BOOK REVIEWS • 150 HINTS AND TIPS • 25
APPLICATION PROGRAMS • SERIES OF ARTICLES FOR BEGINNERS • MANY
ADVANCED TECHNICAL ARTICLES • NEWS AND PRODUCT INFORMATION
• PLUS SPECIAL OFFERS • BIG DISCOUNTS ON A WIDE RANGE OF
PRODUCTS • EVENTS • BRAIN TEASERS • LOCAL CLUBS • FULL
MAGAZINE INDEX
A YEARS SUBSCRIPTION WOULD HAVE BOUGHT YOU ALL THIS
Figures based on the 10 issues of BEEBUG Volume 2.
BUT IT’S NOT TOO LATE TO JOIN FOR VOLUME THREE
BEEBUG PUBLICATIONS LTD. PO BOX 109, HIGH WYCOMBE, BUCKS
please enrol me for volume 3 of BEEBUG at£9.90 (io issues) BEEBUG HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED
name . FOR TWO YEARS AND NOW HAS
AnnDc . 0 „ OVER 25,000 MEMBERS. IT OFFERS
DRESS .TOTAL USER SUPPORT TO ALL BBC
. AMOUNT ENCLOSED .MICRO USERS.
PLEASE MAKE CHEQUES MADE PAYABLE TO BEEBUG PUBLICATIONS LTD.
AND SEND TO:- DEPT6 PO BOX 109, HIGH WYCOMBE, BUCKS
(DISTRIBUTION AGENTS FOR BEEBUG)
SEESCAN DEVICES—
IMAGE PROCESSING SYSTEMS
At SEESCAN, we design and build high quality profes-
! sional image processing equipment, specialising in the
design and construction of real time framestores and
hardware processing systems.
Our products include:
Mk II SEESCAN DIGITAL CAMERA for the BBC Micro —
incorporating:
! * CCTV camera with live digital output
★ Real time frame grab — frame stored in camera
memory in 1/50 second
★ 16K RAM framestore with Z80A dedicated processor
for very fast image processing in the camera
★ Integral power supply
★ Comprehensive software package
A complete image processing package for the BBC at i
£680.00+VAT
FRAMESTORES with interfaces designed for your com¬
puter system — resolutions from 256 x 256 x 6 bits to
800 x 800 x 21 bit colour.
STAND-ALONE IMAGE PROCESSING SYSTEMS from
256 x 256 x 6 bit resolution to 512 x 512 x 21 bit colour.
HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE DESIGN
AND CONSULTANCY
We invite you to see our equipment and discuss your
interest with us at the PCW Show Sept 20-23 on stand
326 next to the Acorn and Sinclair stands.
SEESCAN DEVICES
25 GWYDIR STREET,
CAMBRIDGE CB1 2LG
Tel: 0223 61376/314553
-SEESCAN DEVICES-
38 PCW
DISKS H DISK S H DISKS
*** BEST PRICES — TOP QUALITY — FAST DELIVERY ***
PRICE PROMISE
We will Better any lower delivered price advertised in the current issue of PCW. Please Telephone
Prices per Box (£)
DYSAN
104/1
104/ID
104/2D
204/ID
204/2D
5.25 DISKS — BOXES OF 10
S/sideS Dens 48tpi40Tr
S/side D Dens 48tpi40Tr
D/side D Dens 48tpi40Tr
S/side Q Dens 96tpi 80T r
D/side Q Dens 96tpi80Tr
VERBATIM DATALIFE (Five year warranty)
MD525-01 -HR S/side 5 or D Dens 48tpi 40Tr
MD550-01 -HR D/side S or D Dens 48tpi 40Tr
MD577-01 -HR S/side D or Q Dens 96tpi 77/80Tr
MD557-01 -HR D/side D or Q Dens 96tpi 77/80Tr
10 or 16 hard sectors at same price.
Add El 00 for Plastic Case
1-4 5-9
18.00 17.00
20.00 19.00
28.00 27.00
28.00 27.00
34.00 33.00
10-49
16.00
18.00
26.00
26.00
32.00
15.25 15.00 14.50
21.50 20.75 19 50
22.00 21.25 20.00
28.00 27.25 26.00
UTT
' AMOUNT'
VERBATIM VEREX
MD200-01 S/Side S Dens 48tpi 40Tr
MEMOREX (Five year warranty)
3431 -HR S/side S Dens 48tpi 40Tr
3481 -HR S/side D Dens 48tpi 40Tr
3491 -HR D/side D Dens 48tpi 40Tr
3504-HR S/side Q Dens 96tpi 80Tr
3501 -HR D/side Q Dens 96tpi 80Tr
BASF (Quallmetrlc) — Special Offer
IX S/sideS Dens 48tpi40Tr
1D S/side D Dens 48tpi 40Tr
2D D/side D Dens 48tpi40Tr
ACCESSORIES
HCK5 Head Clean Kit with Fluid
LC5 5.25 Library cases EGLY
LB40-5 ABA Lockable Box 40 Cap inc Disk Pen
LB85-5 ABA Lockable Box 90 Cap inc Disk Pen
VCK-5 Verbatim 5 in Head clean kit
VCD-5 Verbatim 5 in H/c disks (per 10)
LB20-5 Compact Ring Binder 20 Cap
SONY 3.5" DISKS S/Side 80Tr
14.25
13.75
13.25
14.50
14.25
13.75
14.80
14.50
14.00
20.50
19.75
19.00
23.00
22.25
21.50
25.00
24.25
23.25
14.60
14.20
13.80
18.30
17.75
17.20
21.50
20.75
19.50
14.90
14.50
14.00
1.90
1.80
1.70
13.50
13.00
12.50
16.50
16.00
15.50
6.40
6.20
6.00
12.50
12.30
12.10
4.25
4.00
3.75
37.00
36.00
35.00
8 DISKS & RIBBONS
Phone for most Competitive Prices for Verbatim, BASF. Memorex, etc.
POSTAGE/PACKING (UK)
£1/Box* (75p/Box 5+,50p/Box 10+)
50p/Box (35p/Box 5+,25p/Box 10+
£2.50/Box (£2/Box 5+,£1/Box 10+)
Disks/HCK5
Library Case VCK5/VCD5
Lockable Box
'Add 30pBox for 1 st Class
Please contact us for Quantity Discounts (50 + Box) and Trade Accounts.
Official orders accepted from Government and Educational Establishments.
p&p
Total Exc. VAT
VAT 15%
Total Payable
Name. Tel. No. .
Address.
Access/Barclaycard/Cheque No.
If you do not wish to cut out form send order separately
Telephone orders any time - we do the rest -
-<
34 Cannonbury Avenue, Pinner, Middx HA5 ITS
_ 01-868 9548
Pinner Wordpro
BUY
YOUR DRAGON
A FRIEND
Here’s a friend your Dragon has always wanted — a Cumana
disk drive; and Cumana slimline disk drives are friendly to
Dragon is the registered trademark of Dragon Data Ltd.
Delta is supplied by Premier Microsystems Ltd.
The best name in memory
Cumana Limited, Pines Trading Estate,
Broad Street, Guildford, Surrey, GU3 3BH.
Telephone: Guildford (0483) 503121 Telex: 859380
Interests
Home Use
Education
Dealer
Business
Address.
[=i
tzn
dZI
dZ)
Tel. No..
PCW 8/84
Note: If dealer, please attach this form to your letterheading.
n
For further information
about Cumana disk
drives for the Dragon
Micro, please complete
^ and return this coupon
you, the user, as well as to your pocket.
Designed and manufactured to the highest standards,
Cumana disk drives have an independent power supply, 12
months warranty, and are fully assembled and tested before
packaging. As part of the package, your first disk drive for the
Dragon — addressed by Cumana as drive A — is supplied
with a comprehensive user manual, ‘DELTA’ ROM based
cartridge adaptor and demonstration diskette. Upgrading
your system is simple, and up to four Cumana disk drives can
be added without any modification to your microcomputer.
Cumana slimline disk drives for the Dragon Microcomputer
are now available from Spectrum UK, as well as area
distributors and Cumana’s national dealer
network. Look out for the distinctive Cumana packaging in
your high street, today!
Name
AT LAST.THE MIC
RELEASED FROM SOL
ROCOMPITTERIS
ITARY CONFINEMENT
A business thrives on the
free flow of information. Accounts,
production control and sales staff
invariably need access to the same
data.
The microcomputer was
supposed to enhance this process by
making it faster, more accurate and
more efficient.
By an odd quirk, however,
many microcomputer users lose
their freedom to exchange
information. By acquiring inflexible
‘stand alone’ systems they, in effect,
put their information into solitary
confinement.
The astonishing success of
Comart Communicator multi-user
systems is largely because they don’t
imprison you in this way and allow
you to share computer power and
performance among all the key
members of your staff.
Tb be specific, up to nine
users can share the same processing
unit and data storage facilities whilst
making economic use of expensive
peripherals such as printers, plotters
and tape back-up units. Each extra
user shares access to the system
merely by the addition of a simple
VDU and keyboard. All of which
represents a big saving over buying a
complete computer for each.
The Communicator range of
15 models provides everything you
could want in a microcomputer
system. Depending on the
number of users, the
complexity of your
applications and the memory
size and storage capacities
required, you can be
assured of finding
precisely the
system you need-
and pay only
for that. The
Communicator
now comes with
the new Intel 286
powerhouse 32-bit
processor as well
as the established 8 and 16 bit
models. There’s also a choice of
memory from 64K-lMb and of
storage capacities on floppy disks or
5, 20 or 40Mb integral Winchester
disk drives.
The great difference with the
Communicator range, of course, is its
modular design.
You can stay right up with
the latest technologies or expand
and upgrade your current systems,
simply with the change of a circuit
board or two. Add-on modules can
also provide additional storage and
back-up. The Communicator’s
modularity ensures your investment
is safe, because when in the future
you decide you want to share
computer power with more users,
you can simply expand your system
without writing off the cost and
starting all over again.
From 1 9 users can share a Communicator ‘multi user’ system.
It may not surprise you to
know that the Communicator
hardware is among the
hardest around, working
for thousands of prudent
companies worldwide -
and having met the
stringent requirements
of the CCTA-that
includes the
Government.
But however tough the
hardware, it’s the software which
enables you to use it, so it’s good to
know that the Communicator gives
you access to all the business and
commercial standards such as Word
Processing, Financial Planning,
Accounting Suites, Database
Management and Stock Control, plus
communications to IBM and ICL
mainframes. And also far beyond
with specialist suppliers providing
‘industry-specific’ software.
As a nice bonus,
Communicators also come with the
very latest operating systems,
including Digital Research’s multi¬
user Concurrent CP/M which
enables you to switch from up to four
programs simultaneously so your
secretary won’t have to clear the
screen or save work on disk when
you need an urgent report updated
or a fast printout.
And it might interest you to
know that the other chap in
Cambridge isn’t the only one batting
for Britain. We’re British too and one
of the longest-established computer
manufacturers around. This has the
practical advantages of better service
for our customers through a
nationwide network of specialist
dealers plus the maintenance back¬
up of our ‘Microserve’ organisation.
When you choose from the
Communicator range you go for the
freedom to extend the benefits of a
microcomputer system throughout
your business. One that will protect
your investment, grow as you grow,
and never grow old.
Ask us for the key - send for
our colour brochure and we’ll also
give you details of your nearest
Communicator dealer.
comart
Comart Computers Limited, Little End Road, Eaton Socon, St. Neots,
Huntingdon,Cambridgeshire PE 19 3JG
Ttel: (0480) 215005 International +44-480-215005 Tfelex: 32514 Comart G
A member of the ^ Comart Group of Companies
THE MICRO THAT’S GOT PEOPLE TALKING
Name:_
Company:_
Position:_
Address:_
Wf at.
If \ '
.Tfeh
PCW9IS4
All products referred to are trademarks or registered trademarks of the companies of origin.
SORCERER from INFOCOM
I he* most powerful loudei of the
f lit haulers must lx * found, tracked
fhtough treacherous mists of time,
avoiding the evil sorcery where
terrible < leoth awaits, and gaining
the pc. )W(?isand cunning of a true
sorcerer.
*hTabtet
TOUCH TABLET from
KOALA
The friendly, easy wcjy to
use your computer, as a
graphics tablet to write
or draw on the screen,
as a paddle controller
or joystick, as a custom
keyboard, as a way to
make music, play games,
create graphs, all at the
Touch of a Tablet!
THE ENTERTAINERS
FLIGHT SIMULATOR from MICROSOFT
A highly accurate simulation of flight in a
single-engine aircraft, with working
instruments, panoramic out- of-the-
window graphic views, and real-time
flight conditions. All the excitement
of flying in a real plane!
The Softsel dealer has all the software you should need: recreation, home, education and business.
When you want the best service, go to a Softsel dealer who has the best back-up in the world.
Aderdare Glamorgan Inkey Computer Services (0685) 881828. Birmingham Home Entertainment (021) 643 9100. The Software Shop (021) 622 3289.
Bradford Pace Software Supplies (0274) 72 9306. Brighton Gamer (0273) 698424 Bristol Softalk City (0272)877245 Chalfont St Peters Softshop
(0753) 88901. Chester Computer Link (0244) 316516. Guernsey Guernsey Computers (0481) 28738. Jersey Audio & Computer Centre (0534) 7400.
Leighton Buzzard Milton Keynes Music (0525) 376622. Loodon Games Workshop NW10 (01) 965 3713. Adv Technology Centre SE9 (01) 859 7696.
Chromasonk Personal Computers N19 (01) 263 9493. Davinci Computers NW4(01)202 2272. Pilot Software City Wl (01)636 2666. Programs Unlimited
Wl (01) 487 3351. Software City 382 Kings Road SW3 (01) 352 9220. Vk Oddens SE1 (01) 403 1988. Video Palace W1 (01) 637 0366. Woodland
Software W1 (01) 960 4877. The 64 Software Centre WC1 (01) 430 0954. Tomorrows World Today Wl (01) 437 2040. Maidstone Galaxy Video (0622)
682575. Manchester Quod port (061) 969 8729. Paignton Devon Computers (0803) 526303. Preston, Lancs Channel 8 Software(0772)53057.
Redditch MCL (0527) 26051. Sidcup Silka Shop (01) 301 1111. Skipton Singleton (0756)60 078. Slough Silkon Chip (75) 70639 Southampton
Mkrochips(0703) 38899. Stafford Computerama (0785) 41899. leddington Photogrophkal and Optkal Services (01)977 3498/9. Wallasey Mkrobyte
(051)630 6933 Wateriooville G B Mkrolond (0705) 259911. Weymouth Silkon Chip Comps (030 57) 87592 Whitstable 64 Supplies (0227) 266289.
Worthing Data Direct (0903) 40509. York York Computer Centre(0904)641862.
The number one source
for software. In the world.
‘Registered trademarks.
Add a modem to your computer and you’ve opened up a new
dimension of data comms possibilities. Choose the WS2000
and these possibilities stretch world-wide!
The control panel tells you
WS2000 operates on both British/European and Bell (USA)
standards - covering virtually global requirements. The mode
selector is switchable between 300/300, 600,1200,1200/75
and 75/1200 speeds.
Provides database entry
WS2000 gives you access to Prestel, Micronet, BT Gold and
the galaxy of bulletin boards that exist for enquiring micro
users (with WS2000 modems!).
What the press says
The best value
for money in the
modem field
is without doubt
the Minor Miracles WS2000’
- Quentin Reidford, APPLE USER
‘A very versatile device, representing good value for money’
-Peter Tootill, PCW.
The Minor Miracles WS2000 modem could turn out to be the
peripheral you can’t live without’ - Ralph Bancroft, PCN.
Chosen by the BBC for their transatlantic hook-up on
‘Making the Most of the Micro — LIVE!’
Add-on options
ML1 modem/computer lead £8.05 (inc VAT & P/P) -
please specify plug, eg 25-pin DB male. CLI software control
lead £10.92 (inc VAT & P/P) for BBC Micro only. CL2 software
control lead £8.63 (inc VAT & P/P) modem end connector
only.
Outstanding Modem
WS 2000: the leader for versatility,
quality and price.
m
75RX-1200TX
CARRIER *• ^^^ONLINE
ONLINE • T^BlOCAL
IDISSes modem WS 2QO0
au it*.
mk .
‘T! : Bpu
; V23
WS2000 complete with BT modular line plug and socket
and full instructions for only
£129.95
plus VAT & P/P - £152.50.
Send in your order today!
Order by cheque/Barclaycard/Access to:
Miracle Technology (UK) Limited
PO Box 48, Ipswich IP4 2AB
Tel: (0473) 50304
Registered in England No 1756137
Due to the High Technology
incorporated in this product BABT
Approval is still awaited.
Trade
enquiries
invited
miMCLEl
I I Itechnology(uk)ltd
STILL MORE SHOCKING NEWS!!
(Limited period clearances)
EPSON Printers from
£185
SHINWA Printers for
£159
DISKS (BASF) 5.25" and 8"
from £1.00 each
DISK cases (hold 10)
£1.50 each
BBC Parallel leads
£10each
DAISYWHEEL Printers
from £255
DATAPRODUCTS 8010 Printer
£360
These and lots more bargains always on offer.
If you are in the neighbourhood call at our showroom next to Winchester BR station.
Phone 0962 66191
for more shocking news
Nationwide delivery at £5 a parcel — disks from £1.00
(all prices ex-VAT and subject to availability)
50A Stockbridge Road,
. . _ Winchester, Hants S022 6RL,
micro miracles England
PCW 43
The most powerful toolkit yet for ZX BASIC. AU the features
you will ever need; AUTO insert, full RENUMBER, block
DELETE, CLOCK, ALARM, error trapping, break trapping.
Full TRACE with single-step and much, much more. Makes
ZX BASIC easy-to-use and powerful
An excellent assembler, an advanced line-editor, a compre¬
hensive disassembler and a superb 'front panel* debugger
all in one package. Used by many leading software houses to
write their games. “Buy itr Adam Denning 1984.
£25
A powerful and almost full implementation of Pascal - not a
Tiny Pascal. A valuable educational and development tool,
programs typically run 40 times faster than a BASIC equivalent.
Spectrum version includes Turtle Graphics package. '' I haven't
seen any other compiler that could match Hisoft’s Pascal ”
180 High Street North
Dunstable. Beds. LU6 1 AT
Tel: (0582) 696421
for the ZXSpectrum
Hisoft is pleased to announce a new compiler for this popular
and effective systems programming language. Not a tiny-C but
an extensive, easy-to-use implementation of the language.
Allows direct execution of compiled statements. Supplied with
fiinction library. Available direct from Hisoft for £25, or write
for further details.
All prices, UK delivered, relate to 48K ZX Spectrum versions.
Our software is available for many other Z80 machines eg.
Amstrad CPC 464, MSX, Memotech, SHARP MZ700, New-
Brain, CP/M etc. Please write for details.
computer
market
NOTTINGHAM
for Apricot and Sirius business systems.
Call in and discuss your requirements.
BEST PRICES ON FLOPPIES
NASHUA — The name on the finest discs
5 YEAR GUARANTEE — REINFORCED HUB RINGS
No. OF BOXES OF 10
1 - 9
10- 50
EXC. VAT
INC. VAT
EXC. VAT
INC. VAT
SINGLE SIDED, SINGLE DENSITY 48t.p.i.
12.75
14.67
12.00
13.80
SINGLE SIDED, DOUBLE DENSITY 48t.p.i.
13.75
15.81
12.95
14.89
DOUBLE SIDED, DOUBLE DENSITY 48t.p.i.
16.25
18.69
15.25
17.54
SINGLE SIDED, QUAD DENSITY 96t.p.i.
17.05
19.61
16.50
18.98
DOUBLE SIDED, QUAD DENSITY 96t.p.i.
18.75
21.56
18.03
20.73
Collect from our Shop or p+p 1-2 boxes 99p;
3-4 boxes 2.00; 5-9 boxes 2.50; 10 boxes +
FREE p+p.
Urgent orders please telephone to arrange
despatch. Official Government, Educational
orders welcome.
8" Floppies phone for best prices.
27 GOOSE GATE, NOTTINGHAM NG1 1FE (0602) 586454
44PCW
INTELLIGENT VIDEO
— HX-20 INTERFACE
Now you can gather data in the field on your Epson
HX-20 portable micro and examine it in comfort on a
monitor or TV screen!
Specifications
TV and monitor outputs.
16k graphics memory giving 480 x 200 pixels.
Enhanced graphics commands —
LINE, GCLS etc.
4 screen widths — 32,40,72 and 80 column.
24 line display.
Inverse and highlighted character display.
Flashing and static cursor.
Hard copy of text and graphics.
Plus
Fully tested • 6 months warranty • All cables
supplied
£249
carriage paid
Please add 15% VAT. Dealer enquiries welcome
PX-8 compatible version available in November
PC PERIPHERALS LTD
54, South Avenue, Coventry CV2 4DR
/ * , °**>* , °N*l lOlUKlniruu.
FIELDMASTER high quality
programs are for the serious
user of the home computer.
The very latest programming
techniques have been used to
create clear, easy to use soft¬
ware that must be the finest
value available. 1
We have a program for all your needs:-
Powerful spreadsheet, full function 80 column word
processor, versatile 'card index' database, accounts
management, and even a logo & poster printer.
For applications in small business, education, the
professions, industry and the home, etc.
P rices from E2V95 to £84 95 inc VAT tape and disk.
From your local computer shop or direct
from us by our fast mail order service.
)( wv' t 0 *>\ Access/Barclaycard welcome.
For a FREE copy of our software guide, packed
with program information, just write or telephone
(nekJmostef)
Fieldmaster Software Company
Dept pcw 107 Oakwood Park Road, Southgate, London N14 6QD. Tel: 01 886 6709
a division of Young Electronics Ltd. (Established 1970)
Sanpfle far you to buy
Cx ^ BrutisH boa/ids at mutuydy bbcu y f uce6 1 wittf
yuMarteed fatt dedcoety, backed by a fadfyem cvaVtarty .
t&f
le!
New for Apricot!
r 256K RAM CARD
EXPANDABLE TO 640K
Not just another ordinary RAM card, but
one that has unique expandibility. This latest
addition to our growing SimonCard range can be
used with either 64K or 256K dynamic RAM chips at the
flick of a switch, which means you will only need to use up
one precious slot in your Apricot for all your memory
requirements, since our SimonCard starts at 256K and
expands up to 640K, giving the maximum available system
memory on Apricot of 896K. To upgrade from 256K to 640K
is easy! 16 of the 64K chips are replaced by 256K chips
and and if you send your SimonCard back to us for the
upgrade we will part exchange your redundant 64K
chips for the 256K chips. Prices start at £299 for the 256K
version. MS-DOS RAM disk software available.
IBM PC & XT
RAM boards with asynchronous serial port
All boards expandable to 256K
64K + £180 128K + £225
192K + £275
SIRIUS
MS-DOS RAM disc software available
All boards expandable
to 384K
256K + £320
Interfaces complete
4ft cable & connector
TIMEKEEPER/
CLOCKBOARD
WITH BACK-UP
BATTERY £99
All of the above boards are of the highest quality
made with the very best components. They come
with comprehensive manuals for easy and safe
installation.
All prices are exclusive of VAT and postage and
packing.
64K D RAMs
CALL
GENEROUS DEALER DISCOUNTS AVAILABLE
ON ALL BOARDS
SIMON COMPUTERS LTD
8 Lower Addiscombe Road,
.roydon
Surrey CR0 6AA
England
Tel 01-680 4646
DESIGNERS AND SUPPLIERS OF QUALITY
MICROCOMPUTER BOARDS
PCW 45
and
FIRSTtor EPSON
PRINTERS
OKI MICROLINE I
SHEER ELEGANCE
RX 80
100 CPS 80 Col
RX 80 F/T
100 CPS 80 Col
RX 100 F/T
100 CPS 136 Col
FX 80
160 CPS 80 Col
FX100
160 CPS 136 Col
List OEM
Price Price
319 229
450 349
438 339
569 449
OKI MICROLINE
M82A
J20CPS 80 Col
M92P
160CP
M92S
160CP
M83A
120CP
M84P
200CP
M84S
200CP
M93P
M93S
SHEER MAGIC
299 259
80 Col
List
£
OEM
£
449
379
80 Col
539
459
136 Col
489
419
136 Col
799
679
136 Col
899
769
136 Col
585
499
136 Col
675
579
BARGAINS
]
SHEER VALUE
List
OEM
Price
£
Price
£
SHINWA CTICP80
299
199
JUKI Daisywheel
449
349
SEIKOSHA GP100A
OLIVETTI
215
199
JP101 InkJet
DAISYSTEP
199
159
Daisywheel
288
249
P - Parallel Interface, S - Serial
Interface, A - Both supplied as std.
ILL FOR OUR BEST PRICES ON OTHER
PRICING
OEM Prices are exclusive of carriage and
VAT and are current at time of printing.
CARRIAGE ONLY C5 ON ALL ITEMS
By phone, quoting your ACCESS or
BARCLAYCARD number or by sending a
HOW TO cheque for the OEM price stated, plus
’TJjvJJL ' Jl carriage and VAT. Please allow 7 days for
ORDER cheque clearance. 30 days credit for
Official Orders from PLC’s and Public
Authorities, subject to 5% Credit Charge.
TCI CDUOMC OEM Computer Sales
'Xb., 9-11 Regent Street
HOTLINE Rugby
(0788)70522/3/4 Warwickshire CV21 2PE
ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT ORBIT
ELBUG
FOR THE
ACORN
ELECTRON
IF YOU HAVE AN ACORN ELECTRON OR ARE THINKING OF BUYING
ONE THEN YOU SHOULD JOIN THE ELECTRON USER GROUP.
Members receive 10 copies of the magazine ELBUG each year. ELBUG is devoted EXCLUSIVELY to the ELECTRON
MICRO. It is packed with news. Reviews, Hints, lips. Programming ideas, Major articles, plus Regular program
features induing games and useful utilities.
ELBUG, is produced by BEEBUG Publications Ltd., publishers of BEEBUG, the magazine of the National User
Group for the BBC Micro. BEEBUG now has some 20,000 members, and has achieved a high reputation both in
this country and abroad. Acorn and the BBC have both taken out multiple memberships, for example, and our
articles are now syndicated in Australia. (For further details of BEEBUG, see separate advertisement elsewhere in
this issue.)
The formula which makes BEEBUG an invaluable companion for users of the BBC micro will be applied to ELBUG.
By subscribing to ELBUG you gain all the advantages of a single-micro magazine, with no space wasted on programs
and articles for other computers.
Further benefits of membership:
Members’ discount scheme with national retailers of software, hardware and books, with savings of up to 25%.
Members’ software library with a growing range of titles at special prices for members.
SPECIAL OFFER
SUBSCRIBE NOW, AND GET A FREE INTRODUCTORY CASSETTE CONTAINING 8 TESTED
PROGRAMS FOR THE ELECTRON.
1. SPACE CITY Defeat the invading Aliens with your laser, and save the city.
2. 3D NOUGHTS AND CROSSES Pit your wits against the ELECTRON on a 4x4x4 board.
3. RACER Guide your racing car to victory, avoiding other cars and obstacles on the track.
4. 3D MAZE In this challenging game, you must escape from the maze — The screen displays a 3D view from inside the
maze.
5. PATCHWORK A multicoloured display of continuously changing patterns.
6. KEY SET ROUTINE A program to set up the user function keys.
7. MEMORY DISPLAY An efficiently written utility to diplay the contents of memory (ROM and RAM).
8. CHARACTER DEFINER Define individual graphics characters with this useful utility for use in your own programs.
RACER
=1
SPACE CITY
HOW TO JOIN
To subscribe for one year, and get your free cassette, send £9.90 (payable to Orbit) plus a strong stamped addressed envelope (for the cassette) to:
ELBUG-DEPT 6 PO BOX 109, HIGH WYCOMBE, BUCKS. HP11 2TD
EDITORIAL ADDRESS: Beebug Publications Ltd, PO Box 50, St Albans. Herts. AL1 2AR
SIX MONTH TRIAL SUBSCRIPTION (5 ISSUES) UK ONLY £5.90 — FREE CASSETTE OFFER STILL STANDS.
Membership outside UK (one year only): Eire and Europe £16, Middle East £19, America & Africa £21, other countries £23.
46PCW
THE FASTEXT 80
Dot Matrix Printer
from the New Force in Computer Printers
SMITH-CORONA
DATA PRODUCTS
The Fast ext 80 comes from an exciting new range
of printers created to give speed, reliability and
flexibility to the businessman at a price to suit the
home user. Models in the range are compatible
to all home computers, PCs and business micros.
The Fastext 80 has a Centronics parallel
interface - an RS232C serial interface is optional.
A machine of the highest quality, the six-pitch
Fastext 80 performs at a speed of 80 cps with 80
column width (at 10 cpi). The host of features
include a full line buffer, graphics capabilities,
bi-directional text printing and logic-seeking.
Friction feed is standard with a tractor feed
available for continuous stationery.
Smith-Corona Data Products, Unit 23, Northfield Industrial Estate, Beresford Avenue, Wembley, Middlesex HA0 1XP Telephone: 01-900 1222
Fill in the coupon and find out how you can make
the most of your computer with a printer from
Smith-Corona Data Products.
To: Smith-Corona Data Products, Unit 23, Northfield Industrial
Estate, Beresford Avenue, Wembley, Middlesex HA0 1XP.
| Please send me:
□ A free copy of the full colour printer brochure.
□ A list of local dealers.
□ Information on the Smith-Corona Data Products
Roadshow (touring in September - don’t miss it!)
Name_
Company (if appropriate).
Address_
Post code-
.Tel. No.
I Make and model of computer used_ I
| _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ pcwi |
The new UNICORN range from TORCH Computers
gives the enthusiast and professional user a choice of
upgrades which takes the BBC Model B Micro to the
ultimate height of performance.
The result of TORCH’S total commitment to the BBC
Micro is the only complete range of high performance
hardware available. Offering every BBC Micro owner five
new upgrade channels, UNICORN will transform your
BBC into a fully communicating workstation, a CP/M®
compatible business machine or the ultimate in high
powered 32-bit data processing.
At the top of the range, THE UNICORN,
offers the power and sophistication of System
III UNIX® whilst other channels make available
the flexibility of languages such as FORTRAN,
PASCAL, BCPL and COBOL. All models,
with the exception of the HDP240, provide
BBCBASIC(Z80) on theZ80 rather than the
Model B’s 6502.
Tune in to the Channel that most suits
your requirements. Whichever level you
choose you can be sure of a system with
infinitely expandable potential for a confident
future in the world of computing.
\ouew
’ ftfcr
on
The ZEP100
• Z80 Extension Processor
• 4MHz Z80A
• 64KRAM
• 24KROM
The object of any upgrade kit is
to improve processing ability and to
increase data storage capacity.
The UNICORN ZEP100 is
the first stage upgrade
which opens channels
into the world of
serious computing.
TheZEPlOOisthe
proven 8 bit second processor for the^
BBC Model B micro. A Z80 extension
processor which enables the use of
the well established CPN operating
system, giving access to the vast
range of applications programs and
languages available for all CP/M®
micros. When fitted to a BBC model B
microcomputer with compatible high
quality disc drives it provides a
complete business or scientific
computer which can run large appli¬
cations programs or use advanced
languages, with the ability to switch
back to standard BBC programs at
any time.
Any ZEP100 can be linked, via
the Econet® option on the
BBC, to a network of other
f TORCH computers to
provide a work¬
station running
onTORCHNET.
FullTORCHNET
operating sys¬
tems software
is provided to
allow access to
information anywhere
the network, or to com¬
municate with other
. M computers.
| The 64KZEP100 is
supplied with full
software support
including word pro¬
cessing, spreadsheet,
database and
utilities. The ZEP100-
around £299
(ex. VAT).
The ZDP 240
• 4MHz Z80A • 64K RAM
• 24KROM
•Twin, double sided 400K
floppy discs
• Independent integral
power supply
TheHDP 240
>20Mbyte hard disc Winchester
byte
• Double sided 400K floppy disc
• Integral power supply
For users who need much more
storage capacity than is available on
floppy discs and who reauire the
large speed gains that a Winchester
hard disc provides, the third new
channel is now available.
The UNICORN HDP240 combines a
400K floppy disc drive with a 20Mb
hard disc and its associated controller.
The pack connects directly to the disc
and 1MHz bus sockets on the BBC
Model B.
In conjunction with a ZEP100, it
provides a powerful business
computer for running CP/M®
programs with large amounts of data.
The floppy disc can be used for
storage with the Acorn DFS system,
and both discs can be used by other
TORCH systems on theTORCHNET
local area network. The HDP240-
around £1995 (ex. VAT).
The
UNICORN
ZDP240 (Torch Z80
Disc Pack) is the proven
upgrade for the BBC Model B micro¬
computer. Offering the use of more
powerful and flexible languages such
as Fortran, Pascal, BCPL and Cobol, it
provides 800K of disc storage plus a
Z80 second processor with 64K RAM
ond proce
z TORCH’S
running TURCH’s own CP/M® com¬
patible operating system based in ROM.
This advanced design means
that almost all of the 64K RAM pro¬
vided by the Z80 board is available for
CP/M® programming use-an
advantage no other BBC micro
upgrade can offer.
If your BBC micro has the
Econet® option, there is a further
benefit the ZDP240 can offer.
TORCHNET can link together up to
254 upgraded Model B’s on a local
area network, so for enthusiasts,
Clubs and Schools it is a simple and
low-cost way to achieve networking
facilities.
The discs can be used for
storage under the Acorn DFS system
or for CP/M® programs and data.
A comprehensive software pack¬
age is provided with the disc pack. It
includes word and data processing
and a spreadsheet program, along
with utility programs and manuals.
The TORCH Z80 Disc pack is
recommended by the CCTA for
government use. The ZDP 240-
around £699 (ex. VAT).
The HDP68K
• 8MHz MC68000 • 6MHz Z80B
• 256K RAM (68000)
• 64K RAM (Z80)
• 20 Mbyte hard disc Winchester
• Double sided 400K floppy disc
• Integral power supply
The fourth channel in the
UNICORN range is for users who
need the extra processing power of a
68000 32 bit processor, as well as the
Z80 running standard software. The
UNICORN HDP68K provides the
ultimate in performance, offering an
extra 256K RAM and a 68000 pro¬
cessor running at 8 million cycles per
second. It also contains a Z80
processor to allow the running of
existing TORCH software.
The HDP68K-around
£2495 (ex. VAT).
The Unicorn
Spec, as HDP68K PLUS
operating system.
UNIX® System III is the
recognised operating system of the
’80’s. A very powerful and sophisti¬
cated multi-tasking system, it includes
a vast library of utility programmes.
The fifth channel and top of the
range, THE UNICORN, puts UNIX®
within reach of the individual user, at
a price unmatched by any other
UNIX® systems, by combining the
reliability of the BBC micro with
advanced technology from TORCH
Computers.
TORCH UNIX operates under
the network operating system. Using
UNICORN products, a low-cost
network of BBC Micros can be
configured to offer the most complete
range of educational computing
facilities available anywhere.
Other facilities available include
UCSDp-System, LISP, FORTH, PILOT
and PROLOG. The UNICORN -
around £2895 (ex.VAT).
O
n
Open channels for the BBC micro.
To: Torch Computers Ltd., Abberley House,
Great Shelford, Cambridge CB2 5LQ.
Telephone: Cambridge (0223) 841000.
Please send further information on the UNICORN
range plus your FREE 1984 Software Catalogue.
Name
Address
Tel
Post Code
PCW 9
CP/ M is a registered trademark of Digital Research Inc.
Econet is a registered trademark of Acorn Computers Ltd.
Unix is a registered trademark of Bell Telephone Laboratories Inc.
TORCH
COMPUTERS
UK version Model B necessary. Text and Graphics provided by BBC Model B.
Disc interfaces are necessary for use with the Unicorn range. Keyboard provided by BBC Model B.
The Smartest PCs
have Pluto Graphics.
The Pluto Graphics Display Controller will transform
the IBM Personal Computer into a high performance,
colour, raster graphics workstation.
The board is a PC format multi-layer card which
plugs directly into the internal expansion bus,
and needs only a separate colour monitor.
A powerful Motorola 68000 processor
combined with 256K to 384Kbytes of display
memory allows Pluto to work in parallel
with the IBM PC to provide extremely fast
vector drawing and image manipulation capabilities.
Inbuilt functions in ROM give over 65 high-level
commands including vector and raster operations
with logical combination functions.
Three different resolutions are available to suit
all types of applications: 768Hx576V, 16 col¬
ours with interlaced display; 768HX576V,
eight colours, non-interlaced with two display
screens; and 1024HX768V, eight colours,
interlaced.
Io Research Limited, 117-121 High St, Barnet, Herts, EN5 5UZ. Telephone 01-441 5700
LOOKING FOR
SOFTWARE?
*? We hold a library of information on
software
★ This library contains detailed
information on business software for
micros and minis
★ You can use it as a single impartial
source of information to assist you
finding the correct software
★ Our computer will list all the options that
fit your requirements so you can be
satisfied you have made the right choice
★ Once we have found what you’re looking
for we can then put you in contact with a
supplier who is qualified to show you the
software working
★ OUR SERVICE IS FREE AND IS
DESIGNED TO SAVE YOU TIME AND
ENERGY IN UNNECESSARY RESEARCH
★ Phone this number and we will help you
find the software you need
SOFTWARE INFORMATION LIMITED
S 01-6255404 S
PCW51
ao do ao
' - o o a o o^q
3 aa aa o qq
ooou u o
Without the right
program your
computer could
take a dim view
of your
accounts.
If your brand new, super-
intelligent, electronic brain appears
decidedly thick, it’s probably not
to blame. A computer is just a box of
circuits. It’s the program that makes
it a box of tricks. Some programs are
so inadequate they would make any
computer look moronic. Others are
far too complicated for the needs of
the user and become uncontrollable
monsters.
You’ll be glad to know that Sage
keep things simple, but effective.
Our fully-integrated, one-diskette
programs are easy-to-learn and use,
yet cover every accounting function.
From invoicing to final accounts,
it’s all there!
Sage is available on most CP/M,
MS-DOS and PC-DOS computers and
has so far been implemented on over
40 machines including Apple,
Apricot, Epson, IBM-PC, Philips,
Sirius and Zenith. What's more you
can choose the program to suit your
needs from four great-value options.
• SAGE ACCOUNTS £375
• SAGE PLUS £525
• SAGE EXECUTIVE £69 5
• PAYROLL £195
Just return the coupon below and
we ll make sure your computer
doesn’t end up standing in the corner.
| □ Please send me your pcWs""|
explanatory brochure.
□ Please arrange for me to have
1 a demonstration. I
I do not yet own a computer.
I I have a.computer.
■ ‘Delete as appropriate. .
Name.'
I Position . I
Company .
Address .
Tel:
Business Software
SAGESOFT LIMITED. NEI HOUSE. REGENT CENTRE,
NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE NE3 3DS.
Telephone 091 284 7077 Telex 53623 SAGESLG.
52PCW
THE POWER
EEC
\Ai^-ao E«rss:4aE3, /\
ff!
§11
The COMPLETE solution to your POWER SUPPLY problems with the POWER
BANK . . . “BLACKOUTS" will not affect the operation of your computer system.
Micro Systems, Networks, Hard Disks, Printers, Data Transmissions etc.
'Much more than a “spike and surge” suppressor.
*Far superior to a voltage stabilizer.
"Overload and short circuit (output) indication and protection.
"Bench or rack mounting (500VA).
"Battery level monitored — mains on — mains off indication.
"Output derived constantly from self contained sealed for life
batteries.
"Sine wave shaped output — voltage and frequency closely
regulated.
"Genuine “NO-BREAK” unit with continuous output rating of
500-250 &120VA.
Manufactured by:-
POWER TESTING (SALES) LTD, 23 Tallon Road, Hutton, Brentwood, Essex CM13 1TE
Tel: 0277 233188. Telex: 24224MON Ref. 586
.
The problems of looking
after your Micro...
As well as providing the solution to many a problem, Micro’s
however do present more than a ^H , few of their own.
Like how do you prevent ^H it gathering dust when not in use,
stop it from getting kicked when Mum’s cleaning the lounge,
divert the dog from showing it his affections, or even
ensure it at least “arrives” safely when
Dad decides to take it down to the local.
We at P.A.S. realising these needs,
have now developed a range of three
JUV superbly made protective cases
Hi 1 ^B designed specifically for Micro’s. Each
case is constructed from Solid Resin
Fibreboard has a fully protective foam
lining a carrying handle internal
retaining strap, a double snap-fastening lid
and a price that defies even Micro logic.
Please help, 1 am a long suffering Micro owner and H
wish to purchase case/s (tick appropriate box) |
I IhTT] [hc7] [hTa]
I enclose cheque/P.O. to the value of. I
_
■ NAME. ■
■ ADDRESS. I
Prices apply 1 2~BH PAS COMPUTER PRODUCTS LIMITED ■ ■
rnlJk: nnlv UNIT 18, CENTRAL TRADING ESTATE, ■ Please alio* 21 Jays fur delivers Trade enquiries welcome P
CO u. IV. only. I STAINES, MIDDLESEX TW18 4UX. _ _ _ _ M
V I Telephone Staines (STD 0784) 62781 HH IHH Hi HH
CASE HC/1 Takes Micro’s - ZX81, ZX Spectrum, Oric I, CGL M5. CASE HC/2 Takes Micro s - V1C20, BBC ’B’, Commodore 64, Texas Tl/W, One I, Dragon 12.
Colour Genie, Sharp MZ700. Acorn Electron, Lynx, Tandy Colour, Atari 600XL, Acorn Atom. CASE HC/A Can he adapted to take any of the above computers and
various accessories such as Tape Recorder, printer etc.
PCW53
DISCOVER THE DYSAN DIFFERENCE
| 1 imi I1UW 11 IS
Somebody
has to be better than
everybody else.
It’s inevitable.
Somebody is always more determined.
Works harder. And winds up on top.
That’s how it is with Dysan.
We invented the 5 'A" flexible
diskette.
And while everybody else
was trying
to figure
out now
to make them, we
were busy making
them better.
With superior materials. A special
lubricant and jacket liner that extend
diskette life.
Unique manufacturing techniques. Like our
burnishing process that helps eliminate read/
write errors.
And an almost fanatical commitment to
quality. So much so that our diskettes are all
guaranteed 100% error-free. Similarly the
Dysan range of disc packs and cartridges are
manufactured to the same exacting standards.
What does all this mean to you?
Simply this - every Dysan disc or diskette
gives complete confidence of accurate data
recording, safe storage and 100% reliable
retrieval. Every time.
That’s what makes Dysan better.
CORPORATION
For more information on precision magnetic media that leads the world, call us now on FREEFONE DYSAN.
Or write to Dysan (UK) Ltd., 169 Basingstoke Road, Reading, Berks. RG2 ODY.
JBP/784/B
54PCW
WIN! THIS FABULOUS GOLDEN TREASURE, THE K.
GOLDEN JEWELLED HARE OF ‘MASQUERADE’ OR £
WITH
HARERAISER
FROM
HARESOFT
2IH1
t
p|
■
''vflfl'
HARESOFT LTD. P.O. Box 365, London NW1 7JD.Tel: 01-388 3910
I enclose my cheque/RO.(No-) made payab le to Haresoft Ltd. for £_
or please debit my Access Card No.
N ame___Signature_
HARERAISER, is an intriguing puzzle of animated graphics and text produced in 2 ptatfs, . v
purchasers of which will have the necessary information and be eligible for entry into a \ T M suitable for bbc b
competition to discover the locatidnof the Hare. To avoid desecration of the countryside, \/ | spectrum 48 cbm 64
the treasure has notbeen buried, the winner mereb having to pinpoint its location,
to claim this superb prize. ParN, Hareraiser (Prelude) is on sale NOW. Part 2, Harcraiser N '■ \JX
(Finale) from mid September. (Both parts can be ordered on one application). This is a UNIQWt
opportunity, you or your family could solve this adventure puzzle and win this beautiful treasure.
Be sure of your participation. Order NOW and avoid disappointment. Binders keepers! a- s y Y'X , ..A[B
. k •• * Wfc. \ A, v v 4 X- \
Post Code_
ORIC/ATMOS 48 DRAGON 32
VIC 20 EX
AMSTRAD
COMPUTER
PRELUDE/FINALE
QTY.
PRICE
TOTAL
8.95
8.95
8.95
48 hour despatch.
Price incl. p & p U.K. only
MB
In 1982, three Americans discovered a
blindingly obvious fact. Businessmen wanted
a personal computer that was genuinely portable.
They made one and called it Compaq."
Within one year Compaq" was the biggest
success in the history of American business.
Within one year Compaq" were number
two to IBM" in the micro computer market.
All because of a machine that weighed a
mere 28lbs and could be moved around as an
integral unit and operating in seconds.
Which was not only more compact than
IBM’s " personal computer but offered the most
complete compatibility with IBM" software.
IBM* IS THE REGISTERED TRADE MARK OF INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES
The Compaq" delivers 256K byte RAM, all
within a tough outer casing that even repels
bullets. So it’s going to be around for a long time.
Ask 100,000 Americans, or any one of the
dealers listed overleaf. _
comma
COMPAQ
IS THE REGISTERED TRADE MARK OF COMPAQ COMPUTERS LTD
NEW HORIZONS
'Framework' opens new horizons in business computing. It
allows you to configure data and information without constraints
to your creativity.
A window on the future.
'Framework' takes 'window' technology a giant step forward,
to 3-D frames that give a combination of spread-sheet, word
processing, graphics, data-base management and communications
in a single business package.
Through a 3-D surface of frames technology, the IBM PC and
PC compatible user organises ideas logically, and has instant and
simultaneous access to data for viewing and manipulating.
'Framework' enables a management report to be indexed
according to constituent frames, combining figures, charts and text
in any configuration.
The spreadsheet facility has 140 functions, with the ability for
the creation of even more. The database absorbs files from our
best-selling dBase II package, and allows other DOS programs to
be accessed through the DOS frame. If you're looking for business
software that gives you this infinite flexibility, you've just found it.
Through 'Framework'. See it now at your Softsel dealer.
Bicester The Computer Terminal (0869) 253361. Bradford Pace Software Supplies (0274) 575973. Bristol Colston Computer Centre (0272) 276619. Croydon
Programs Unlimited (01)681 8941. Edinburgh Microcentre (031) 556 7354 Computerland (031 )225 3691. Hemel Hempstead Data Efficiency (0442)60155.
Kingston upon Thames Interface Network (01) 541 1055. London Personal Computers EC2 (01) 377 1200. Digitus WC2 (01) 379 6968. first Computers W1
(01) 499 3046. FDS Microsystems W2 (01) 229 9431. Istel WC2 (01) 831 0361. Programs Unlimited W1 (01) 487 3351. Merchant Systems EC2 (01) 583 6774.
Pilot Software City W1 (01) 636 2666. Computerland W2 (01) 723 3071. Computerland EC1 (01) 248 8385. Programs Unlimited WC2 (01)340 9006. Planning
Consultancy SW1 (01) 286 6411. Bonsai WC1 (0)5800982. Morse Computers WC1 (01)831 0644. Timon Computer Group EC3(01 )623 2550. London
Computer Centre W1 (01)388 5731. The Computer Terminal WC2 (01) 236 2187. Orys Systems W1 (01) 636 0476. Interface Network W1 (01) 486 9121.
Manchester Computerland (061) 833 9327. Newcastle upon Tyne Computerland (0632)612626. Newbury Gill Anthony Systems (0635) 35831. Norwich
Anglia Computer Centre (0603) 667033 Reading Thames Valley Systems (0734) 581829. Slough Granada Microcomputer (0753) 820966. Southampton
Computerland (0703)39571 Swindon Computacentre(0793) 694997. Twickenham Simmons Magee Comp (01) 891 4477. Wilmslow Fairhurst Instruments
(0625)533741. Woking West Surrey Computers (0486) 272573. York Programs Unlimited (0984)32089.
The number one source
for software. In the world.
Ask any of these dealers
what 100,000Americans found
so right about Compaq:
LONDON
Bonsai Ltd, 112-116 New Oxford St, London WC1A 1HJ, Tel-01-5800902
Computacenter Ltd, Salisbury House, Finsbury Circus, London EC2,
Tel-01-638 4274
290 Kensington High Street, London W14, Tel - 01-602 8405
Computerland, 59-60 Holborn Viaduct. London ECLTel - 01-248 8385
38 Edgvvare Road. London W2 2EH,Tel -01-723 3071
Digitus, 10-14 Bedford Street, Covent Garden, London WC2E 9HE, Tel -01-379 6968
First Computer 40 Duke Street, London W1M 5DA, Tel - 01-499 3046
76/77 High Holborn, London WC2 Tel - 01-242 1418
84 Piccadilly, London W1 Tel -01-491 7487
110 Moorgate, London EC2 Tel - 01-638 2103
Dcbenhams PLC. 334-348 Oxford St. London W1A 1EF,Tel-01-580 3000
c/oDebenhams PLC, Station Road, Harrow HA1 1NA,Tel-01-863 2211
Hoskyns, Africa House,64-78 Kingsway, London WC2B6BL.Tel -01-242 1951
Intelligence (UK) PLC Network House, Wood Lane, London W12 7SL.
Tel -01-740 5758
Interface Network PLC 18A-20 Baker St .London W1M IDE. Tel-01-487 4701
289-293 High Holborn. London WC1V9HZ
Forge House,66 High St. Kingston, Surrey,Tel-01-5411055
MBS Personal Computers, St Mary Abchurch House. 123 Cannon St. London
EC4N5AX. Tel -01-626-2181
Microplan Communications Ltd,
Axe and Bottle Court, 70 Newcomen Street, London SE1 1YT. Tel - 01-378 6691
Microware, 637 Holloway Road. London N19 5SS.Tel - 01-272 6398
P4-P Micro Distributors Ltd. 1 Gleneagles Road. London SWI6 6AY
Tel-01-769 1022
Personal Computers, 218 &r 220/226 Bishopsgate, London EC.2M 4)S.
Tel-01-377 1200
Planning Consultancy Limited,
46-47 Pali Mall, London SW1Y 5JG.Tel-01-839 8890
Enterprise House.8-28 Woodfield Place, Harrow Road. London W9.
Programs Unlimited, 35 Baker Street, London WIN lAE.Tel -01-487 3351
19 Imperial House. Kingsway WC2,Tel - 01-2409006
60 George Street,Croydon. Surrey CR0 1 PD,Tel-01-6818941 2
Silicon Valley Computer Centre, 164 Grays Inn Road.London Wt 1.
Tel-Ol-833 3391
Simmons Magee Computers Ltd, 13 York Street,Twickenham. Middx TW1 3JZ
Tel-01-8914477
Specialist Computer Centres Ltd, 91 Wigmore Street. London W1H 9FA.
Tel-01-935 4150
Stag Terminals, 30Church Road. Teddington. Middx TW11 8PB.01-977 3288
Star Computer, 64 Great Eastern St . London EC.2A 3QR.01-739 7633
Steiger Computers Ltd, Steiger House. North Circular Rd.Stonebridge Park. London
NW10 7QZ.Tel 01-961 6000
Sumlock Bondain Ltd, 263-269City Rd. London ECIV IJX.Tel -01-2500505
Thos. Hill International Ltd, Hill House 142 Clocktower Rd. Isleworth. Middlesex
TW76DT. Tel-01-847 1881
SOUTH
4B Microcentres Ltd, 13-14 North Bar. Banbury.Oxon OX16 0TF, Tel-0295 67551 2
Anglia Computers Ltd, 26 Princes St. Ipswich, Suffolk
88 St Benedict's Street. Norwich. Norfolk. Tel - 0603 667031-7
Byte Shop, 23 Cumberland Place. Southampton SOI 2BB. Tel -0703 334711
Computacentre Ltd, 14 16 Oxford Road. Reading.Tel - 0734 509911
Computerland.
Spencer House. 12-14 Carlton Place. Southampton SOI 2EA Tel-0703 39571
Data Supplies, Sterling House. 165-175 Farnham Road. Slough. Berkshire SL1 4XP
Tel-075 3 820004 6
Essex Computer Centre, 216 Moulsham Street,On-The-Parkwav.ChelmsIord. Essex
CM2 0LR, Tel-0245 358702
First Computer, 3 4 Prudential Building. Williams St. Slough. Tel-0753 821545
Granada Business Centre, 119 High Street. Slough SL1 1DH. Tel-0753 820966
Debenhams PLC Millbrook,Guildford GUI 3UU,Tel 0483 32102
c o Debenhams PLC, Market Place. Romford, RM1 3ET, Tel - 0708 28456
c o Debenhams PLC, Magdalen Street. Oxford OX1 3AA.Tel- 0865 250530.
Instrumatic,Oxford House. 23 West Wvcombe Road. High Wvcombe. Bucks HP11 2QL.
Tel-0494 450336
Interface Network, Unit 17. Bilton Road. Kingsland Industrial Park. Basingstoke
RG24 0l.).Tel 0256 61191
MBS Personal Computers, 119 120 High St. Eton. Windsor, Berks Sl.4 6AN.
Tel - 07535 68171
Microtechnology Ltd, 51 The Pantiles. Tunbridge Wells. Kent TN2 51 E.
Tel-0492 45433
Oxford Data Systems. 29 Pound Wav. Cowley Centre, Oxford OX4 3XX
Tel-0865 717720
Ranmor Computing Ltd, 14 Nelson Street.Southend-on-Sea. Essex SSI 1EE.
Tel-0702 3 39262
Systemsworld Ltd, Intelligence House.62/78 Merton Road, W’atlord WD1 7BY,
Tel-092 3 49677.
The Professional Connection Ltd, The Old Manor 1 louse. Eareham. Ilampshire
PO 16 7AR Tel - Eareham 0329 230870
Tesco Business Systems, Bessemer Road, Welwyn Garden C ity. Herts AL7 1HB.
Tel-07073 25161
West Surrey Computers Ltd, Chandler House. Anchor Hill, Knaphill. Woking.
Surrey GU21 2NL. Tel- 0487 88561
WEST
Colston Computer Centre Limited,The Colston Centre. 11 Colston Avenue.
Bristol BS1 4UB Tel - 0272 276619
Computacenter Ltd. 1 heat re Square. Swindon SN1 1QN Tel - 0793 694997
Sumlock Bondain, 36 King Street. Bristol BS1 4D2.Tel -0272 276685
MIDLANDS
Computerworld. 19 Abingdon Square. Northampton NN1 4AA. Tel - 0604 31661
P4-P Micro Distributors Ltd. Dale Street. Bilston.WVH 7|Y Tel 0902 4 3913
Specialist Computer Centres. Lichfield House. 85 Smallbrook.Queensway.
Birmingham B5 4JF.Tel - 021-643 4743
Sumlock Bondain Ltd. 266-268 Stratford Road. Shirley. Solihull. Birmingham.
Tel-021-745 8616
NORTH
Computerland. 37-41 Grainger St. Newcastle-upon-Tvne NE1 5JE. Tel -0632612626
2-10 Albert Square. Manchester M2 6LYV. Tel - 061 83 3 9327
Hoskyns Springlield House. Springfield Road. Sale. Manchester.Tel 061969 3611
P4-P Micro Distributors Ltd. New Hall Hey Rd. Rossendale. Lines.Tel - 0706 212321.
Programs Unlimited 26 Eossgate. York. Tel - 0904 32089 81 Washway Road.
Sale. Cheshire. Tel - 061 434 8054
Specialist Computer Centres. 2a North John St. Liverpool L2 2RT. Tel-051-227 1285
Thos. Hill International. Hill House.45-53 George Street. Newcastle-upon-Tvne
NE4 7LQ. Tel 06 32 739 261
Yorkshire Microcomputers. Standard House.James Street. York YOl 3BU,
Tel-0904 642941
SCOTLAND
Abtex Computer Systems Ltd, 58 Carden Place. Aberdeen AB1 1UP Tel - 0224 647074
Computerland. 126-128 George Street, Edinburgh EH24TA, Tel-031 225 3693
Microcentre, 30 Dundas Street.Edinburgh EH3 6JN,Tel - 031-556 7354
207 Bath Street.Glasgow G2, Tel -041-248 2767
Thos. Hill International Ltd, 169 Ingram St. Glasgow G1 1DW, Tel 041-552 8344
comPAa,
COMPAQ* IS III! REGISTERED TRAD! MARK OF COMPAQ COMPUTER LID
PCW59
“i- 1 —r
c
PRINTED W ORD
Lg^RICES
TOP SERVICE
~r
<jem ini /OX
1
HU
JUKI 6100
One Year Warranty
20 CPS : BiDirectional & Logic Seeking
10,12,15 & Proportional Spacing
Wordstar Compatible
2K Buffer: 13 Inch Platen
Underline : Backspace + Lots more
Centronics Interface Standard
RS 232 Interface £54.00 + VAT Extra
Tractor Feed £99.00 + VAT Extra
Single Sheet Feeder £238.00 4- VAT Extra
JUKI 6100 £347.83 4- VAT = £400.00
BBC/ORIC or DRAGON Package
JUKI 6100 + CJE PRINTER PACKAGE
£420.00 Inc. VAT
CANON PW-1080A
Near letter Quality Printer
NLQ Mode 23 x 18 Matrix: 27 cps
Draft Mode 11x9 Matrix : 160 cps
Full range of Epson FX 80 Print Codes
Friction & Tractor Feed
Centronics Interface Standard
CANON PW-1156A (Accepts 15" Paper) Available
CANON PW-1080A £295.65 + VAT =£340.00
CANON PW-1156A £391.30 + VAT = £450.00
PACKAGE PRICE for BBC MICRO/DRAGON/ORIC
CANON PW-1080A C.J.E. PRINTER PACKAGE £365.00lnc. VAT
CANON PW-1156A C.J.E. PRINTER PACKAGE £470.00 Inc. VAT
Special RS 232 Printer Bargain
STAR DP8480 (8” Printing) £197.00 Inc. VAT
Ideal for BBC/Newbrain/HX20 & Spectrum Int. 1
Phone for full specification
C.J.E. Micro’s BBC Printer Packs
For Star, Canon & Juki Printers include:
1 The Printer
2. Delivery by Securicor
3. Cable to the BBC 1.3 Metres
4. Screen Dump Progam (M/C Source)
5. Text Dump Program
6. Function Key set up Program. For use with WORDWISE
7. Function Key Label Printing Program. For use with above.
8. VIEW Printer Driver
9.100 Sheets of Paper
10. Mains Plug with 3 Amp Fuse
11. Booklet giving details of using the printer with a BBC.
12. Character Defining Program for Downloadable-character-set
C.J.E. Printer Packs for other micro’s include:-
Printer, Cable, Paper, Mains Plug & Delivery
fcRwiM
STAR GEMIN110X
One Year Warranty
True Descenders 9x9 Matrix
120 CPS Bidirectional & Logic Seeking
40, 48,68,80, 96,136cpl
Italics, Emphasized, Double strike,
Super & Sub Scripts
Downloadable Character Set
Hi-Resolution & Block Graphics
Friction or Tractor Feed
10X10” Carriage, 15X15” Carriage
Centronics Interface Standard
RS232 Int. £52.00 4 VAT Extra
Gemini 10X £235.00 Inc VAT
Package for BBC/DRAGON/OR 1C
GEMINI 10X 4- CJE Printer Pack £255 Inc. VAT
Star Gemini 15X £390 Inc. VAT
STAR DELTA 10
SPEC. AS FORI OX PLUS:-
160CPS:8K BUFFER
CENTRONICS + RS232 INT’S STD
£320 4* VAT = £368.00
BBC MICROMODEL £399.00
Electron £199.00
BBC Micro Model B with Disc Int. £469.00
Large Range of Accessories including Disc
Drives. Printers, Monitors always in stock
Printer Cables
BBC to 36 Way Centronics Type Connector £15.00
Dragon to 36 Way Centronics Type Connector £15 00
Oric to 36 Way Centronics Type Connector £15 00
Torch to 36 Way Centronics Type Connector £20 00
Serial Printer Cables
BBC to 25 way D type £9.50
EPSON HX20 to 25 way D type £9.50
NEWBRAIN to 25 Way D Type £12.00
25 way D type to 25 way D type £15.00
Blank Cl 5/C30 Cassettes Ten for £4 50 ANY MIX
Send SAE for Full Price List
VAT INCLUDED WHERE APPLICABLE
PHONE/CREDIT CARD ORDERS WELCOME
Postage 50p per order or as stated
24 Hr Securicor Delivery
for Printers/Disk Drives £8.00
(SHOP/WORKSHOP CLOSED MONDAYS)
C.J.E. Microcomputers
Dept (PCW), 78 bngnton Road, Worthing
W. Sussex BN 11 2EN (0903)213900
EXPORT ORDERS WELCOME
RING FOR SAMPLE PRINTOUT, FULL SPECIFICATIONS & LATEST PRICES
BEST PRICES & BACKUP ON THE STAR JUKI & CANON PRINTERS
If you ever have to bring work home from the office
you can now tackle it professionally thanks to Practicorp’s range
of advanced programs for the Commodore 64.
PRACTICALC 64.
Working on budgets, sales
forecasts or cash flow at home has
never been easier. With the
Practicalc 64 spreadsheet and your
Commodore 64 you have a totally
professional system. It has 2000
cells, more than 20 mathematical
functions, the ability to insert or
delete rows and columns, sort
information alpha-numerically
and seek specific information.
And you won’t need a cash flow
projection to see if you can
afford it at only £44.50 (disc)
or £39.95 (tape).
PRACTIFILE 64.
If you need access to files, client
or patient information, names and
addresses then Practifile 64 is your
instant answer.
Practifile is able to handle
3800 record entries, sort them, file
them, retrieve them. It can calcu¬
late within individual files and pre¬
pare your own style of reports. And
what’s more its easy menu-driven
program makes it child’s play to
operate. Only^£44.50 for the disc^
INVENTORY 64.
For keeping track of stock,
Inventory 64 is just the job. It’ll tell
you how much stock you have,
where it is located, how much it’s
worth, what you should re-order,
and from whom. With a capacity
of 650 items, Inventory 64 is ideal
for the average small business, and
excellent value at only £29.95(disc).
Practicorp’s software is avail¬
able at all good computer stores,
including selected branches of
Boots, W. H. Smith and Menzies.
Clip the coupon for details of
ryour nearest stockist.
Please send me details of your
Commodore 64 programs.
i
No Nonsense Software
Goddard Hoad, Whitehouse Industrial Estate, Ipswich IP1 5NP.
Telephone: 0473 462721
Address:.
PCW 9 84
PCW61
Here are Fred, Stan and
John working out their
VAT returns!
Fred, Stan and John used to spend their spare
time keeping the books and worrying about their VAT
Returns. That was before Micro Simplex gave them a
hand.
The Micro Simplex system automatically makes
small business Accounting simple.
VAT Returns are completed by pressing a key.
You have all the information you need to increase
your profits at a moments notice.
Save your leisure time for yourself, it's the Perfect
Answer.
For further information return the coupon or
telephone (0625) 615000.
Available on a wide range of home and business
micros.
I Please return coupon to: Micro Simplex Ltd.
I FREEPOST, Macclesfield, Cheshire SK11 6YA.
Name_
i Company Address_
n
Telephone_
Type of Business-
Make the most of your leisure time
62PCW
□ speed for business and
sional use,
Engineered by Qume for superb
print quality and reliability for
years of every day use
Qume (UK) Limited,
idgewater Close, Reading, Berkshire RG31JT.
Tel: Reading (0734) 584646. Telex: 849706
A British Company of ITT
- and the price is right
Other important features -
1. Interface compatibility with
most popular desktop computers
1. e. Serial, Centronics Parallel
or Qume Sprint 3
2. Compact design-user friendly
3. The widest range of easily
interchangeable typefaces in
the industry
4. Uses Qume standard
Printwheelsand Ribbons the
most accessible range available
Accessories include -
Optional Forms Tractor and Letter
Guide
Backed by Qume’s proven
World-Wide Sales and Service
organisation
■■■■
■■■■■■■■
DON’T MISS THEM A
GET A i
VIEW ON
AT THEf
EARN HOW m SURVIVE
THE COMPUTER JUNGLE
ATTHEP.C.W. SHOW
^pp\>
8a
WITH ALL THE OPTIONS
TTHEP.C.W. SHOW
NIFICENT SEVENTH
The 1984-
Personal
Computer
* Show
t £mber, olymp '^ 1
September 19th - Trade/Press day only.
The greatest micro
show on earth.
TIMES: 10am-7pm weekdays. 10am-5pm Sunday. FEATURES INCLUDE: “BBC Radio Live at the PCW
n .” Businessman’s advisory centre. Top 20 Games sponsored by Websters. The Leading Edge/the latest
products at the show. Amateur Computer Clubs. “Mastering the Micro” — Top 20 Computer Books/Software.
ADMISSION: £3.50 p.p. Group tickets (10 people and over) £2.50 p.p. Children (under 12) £1.50.
Please apply for your advance tickets to: Montbuild, 11 Manchester Square, London W1. Telephone:
01-486 1951.
LANCED
DMPUTERS
W. SHOW
If you're really interested in the world of
micro-computers there's only one place to be in September.
The most popular micro-computer show in the world.
The 7th Personal Computer World Show at Olympia 2
from September 20th to the 23rd.
Mingle with the giants of the micro world. Find out
what's new and up and coming your way. We think you'll
profit from the experience.
So if you want to be in the know, you know where to be
in September.
DISCOVER HOW TO
CHOOSEA
ATTHEP.6W.
APRICOT... IBM-PC...ALTOS...FORTUNE...NCR-TOWER...CONVEROEN1
.
Fast, multi-user performance (written in "C")
Sophisticated features e.g. automatic foreign
currency, integrated report generator
Standard interface fo database and word
processing packages
A pleasure to use,with excellent documentation
Tetraplan has the flexibility and sophistication to run on
almost all machines - from single user PCs to powerful
multi-screen minicomputers. Its component modules can
be used individually or together as an integrated system:
Sales ledger Order entry. Invoicing and analysis
Purchase ledger Purchase order processing
Nominal ledger Job costing
Stock control Report generator
Tetraplan is quite simply the best business software
around. But don't take our word for it-see a demonstration
and you'll probably find, like 8 out of 10 businessmen who
do, there's no need to look any further.
To learn more, call 0494-452001/4
Tetra Business Systems Limited, Tetra House, 14-16
Temple End, High Wycombe, Bucks HP13 5DR.
MS-DOS Is a trade mark of Microsoft Corp. UNIX is a trade mark of AT & T Bell Laboratories Inc.
- ..
BUSINESS ACCOUNTING SOFTWARE ON A DIFFERENT PLANE
Fully guaranteed
Direct drive
Half-height
Zero track sensor
What can we say about our new disk drive? It's got everything except an expensive price tag.
Whether you're a first time buyer or looking to upgrade your system, this is the drive for you.
The XLS2B Drive (Fully ttpple ® or BBC micro compatible)
Single sided driue £129.85 +um
Double sided driue £144.85 +urt
Complete with cable and manual —
just plug it in and drive it away.
We can offer the drive at this low price We've been supplying disks and drives to
because we buy in bulk from an international OEMs and institutions for four years and
manufacturer, test and brand the equipment only now have we decided to sell direct to
in our London laboratory. the consumer and pass on the savings.
Access cards (24 hours) 01 -631 0255 Personal callers welcome.
Disco Technology Limited, Lex House, 3/6 Alfred Place, London WC1, England.
Telephone 01-631 0255
Please rush me - (qty) Apple compatible XLTRON drives at £150 each (inc. VAT and p+p)
-(qty) BBC compatible single sided drives at £150 each (inc. VAT and p + p)
-(qty) BBC compatible double sided drives at £ 169 each (inc. VAT and p+p)
Free Utilities Disk with BBC compatible drives.
Please send details of XLTRON Diskettes □
I enclose my cheque for £
or debit my Access card No____ . , __Signature
Name
Address
Postcode_ pcw 9 84
To Disco Technology Ltd, Lex House, 3/6 Alfred Place, London WC1.
c Apple is the trade mark of Apple Computers Inc.
© Certain Advertising Ltd 01-9301612
FOR THE BBC MICRO
SOFTWARE
SALE SALE SALE
TINY PASCAL
Pascal-T is a 16k Eprom program capable of compiling Source Pascal
into a compact and very fast threaded-interpretive-code. Full editor and
disc-support are included and the program is supplied together with
comprehensive documentation. PRICE £59.00 + V.A.T.
X CAL
An expert Computer Aided Learning package in 16k Eprom and
support disc. No programming skill required to construct learning
sessions’ as the program is screen’ driven. Facilities include Text
pages, Graphics and Histograms. PRICE £65.00 + V.A.T.
I.B.M.
GOLFBALL PRINTERS
SALE PRICE £39.99 + VAT
INTERFACE EXTRA
FORTH
FIG-FORTH in 8k Eprom together with manual. PRICE£34.72 + V.A.T.
LOGO-FORTH
A 16k Eprom program introducing this very powerful but extremely
friendly Turtle-Graphics language. Users also have full access to the
Fig-Forth support nucleus. Full documentation is included.
PRICE £59.00 + V.A.T.
M-UTS
Powerful machine code monitor with disc utilities.
PRICE £19.95 + V.A.T.
(Special discounts available for educational establishments for all the
above software)
HARDWARE
Always in stock Printers, Disc Drives IC’s etc.
FOR THE EPSON HX20
SOFTWARE
FORTH ROM including full documentation.
HARDWARE
Expansion Unit, Paper, Microcassettes etc.
Retail/Mail Orders/Dealers
enquiries to:
HCCS Associates
533 Durham Road, Low Fell,
Gateshead, Tyne & Wear
NE9 5EY
Tel: (0632) 821924
£34.72
Please phonefor quotes
Retail sales also at:
HCCS Microcomputers
122 Darwen Street
Blackburn, Lancs.
Tel: (0254) 672214
5” Monitor (New). £40.00 + VAT
Keyboards. from £4.00 + VAT
Mini Cassette Drives. £20.00 + VAT
Centronics Printers (New)from £150.00 + VAT
PCB’s, FANS, POWER UNITS, ETC.
COME AND LOOK AROUND
P & R COMPUTER SHOP
Salcote Mill, Goldhanger Road,
Heybridge, Maldon,
Essex.
PHONE: (0621) 57440
HOURS: MON-FRI 9am-5pm SAT 9am-12am
■ High Resolution GrcipRJcs^ \
■ Trouble-Free Performance |
■ Personal/Business use
HOTLINE OR DECS PHONE,
(0925)602690/62907 I
Send cheque/P.Os to:
Warrington WA4
PHILIPS—12" TP200
12" Hi-resolution
Mono-Monitor
Don’t waste your time... waiting for printouts!
PRESS THE BUTTON...!
AND THE ECONO-BUFFER RUNS
THE PRINTER-BUFFER WITH ALL
THESE EXTRA’S ...AND THE BEST
AND CHEAPEST YOU CAN BUY.
NO EXTRA SOFTWARE
NEEDED...
COMPATIBLE WITH ANY STANDARD/
CENTRONICS PRINTER / VV
Options select by a simple press.
Superb quality.
Attractive compact design.
Professional documentation. J
SPACE COMPRESSION * g
£ /
SINGLE PAGE MODE £
for stops between
printouts or pages g
Contact your I ^ /
local dealer / H/ i
or ZERO V
for details
buttons for
various
page lengths
COPY-FUNCTION
also 16K (£102) and
32K (£111) versions available.
Printer buffer also for RS 232-Centronics
16K 32K 48K
£94 £109 £123
I • All prices exclude VAT
nCPTDnUIPC • Supplier to schools, universities and I
fcLCLI KUnlLo government departments
-i/irk viMr'OTnrrr ‘ • All products guaranteed
r^ GSTREET(NA l H H0USE) • Send for free details + order form
GT. YARMOUTH NR30 2-S • Money refunded (less P.&P.), if goods re-
TELEPHONE:(0493)-2023 turned in good condition within 10 days
ZERO Companies: The Netherlands: Tel. 01892 - 5333 - Germany: Tel. 02821 - 28826 Sweden: Tef. 0382 - 40037
68PCW
Haifa box
is better
than one?,
or debit my Access card no.
Name_
Address_
Signature
pew q
Postcode
Telephone
xlsss
Please rush me
(qty) storage box(es) filled with 50 s/sided disks at £59.50 each,
(qty) storage box(es) filled with 50 d/sided disks at £87.25 each,
(qty) storage box(es) filled with 25 s/sided disks at £33.65 each,
(qty) storage box(es) filled with 25 d/sided disks at £47.15 each.
_ (qty) empty storage box(es) at £ 11.
Prices include VAT and P + P. I enclose cheque for
25 s/s d/d disks + box £29 r —
-I J#J « , P^YATandP + r 50 s/s d/d disks + box £50
ZD d/s d/d disks + box &5y _ A plus vat andp+p
plus VAT andP + P 50 d/s d/d 4- hflV £75
We ran the advertisement opposite to move some stock left from a v , p p
cancelled order. And move them it certainly did. We’re still selling around pIUSVAl and! +1
30 boxes a day, that’s over 30,000 disks a month. So we bought some more,
and are going to continue selling at the same price.
We also got a lot of people on the phone asking if we could supply slightly
fewer disks, and as you see, we’re now offering boxes in 25’s as well.
Every order of 25 or 50 comes packed in the same rigid plastic storage box
with four dividers, we’ve kept the same high specification and all disks
carry our two for one guarantee.
To order, just clip the coupon below. Personal callers welcome.
We accept orders from all government bodies, schools, universities, libraries, armed forces
etc. We despatch on receipt of an official purchase order.
If you can’t raise a cheque without an invoice please post or telephone your order and we’ll
send you a proforma by return.
Disco Technology Limited, Lex House, 3/6 Alfred Place,
London WC1, England. Telephone 01-6310255,
To: Disco Technology Ltd, Lex House, 3/6 Alfred Place, London WC1.
CONVERT YOUR 80-BUS SYSTEM
T016 BIT WITH A COSTGOLD
ADD-ON PROCESSOR BOARD
Run CP/M-86. Read/write IBM PC compatible discs.
CA802 £525
8MHz 8088 Processor
256K Bytes RAM
Serial port and real time clock
EPROM based monitor
Supports CP/M-86, concurrent CP/M-86 and MP/M-86
CA801 £375
8MHz 8088 Processor
128K Bytes RAM
EPROM based monitor
Supports CP/M-86
Can be expanded later to CA802 spec
CP/M-86 for CA801/CA802, including utilities £199
SPECIAL OFFER . .. CA802 and CP/M-86 £695
Either 80-bus format board enables retention of the Z80
card to run your existing software. Both cards will read or
write IBM PC compatible discs and all Gemini formats. A
8088 bus expansion connector is also provided.
All prices include p&p but exclude VAT at 15%.
CA801 & CA802 are available now. Orders to
Costgold Research, The Old School, Stretham,
Cambridge CB6 3LD. Tel: (035 389) 282/3.
Coming soon, Concurrent CP/M-86
COSTGOLD RESEARCH, THE OLD SCHOOL,
STRETHAM, CAMBRIDGE
The name of the
Game...
..IS COMING!
THOUGHTS & CROSSES
37 MARKET STREET, HECKMONDWIKE, WEST YORKS
Telephone: 0924 402337
RIBBONS
Epson
MX/FX/RX 80.£6
MX 100.£15
SeikoshaGP.£4.50
Microline.£2.30
Anodex.£12.50
DISK DRIVES
Pace or Cumana
Single
100K SS 40T.£149
200K DS40T.£173
400K DS80T.£215
Double
200K SS 40T.£295
400K DS 40T.£329
800K DS40/80T.£417
3" 200K DS.£125
Commodore 1541.£210
Torch Disk Pack inc. software
£800
Memotech Single.£410
Memotech Double inc. software
£800
Philips V7001 12" Green Screen
Monitor 18MHz Anti Glare.£70
COMPUTERS
BBC B.£399
BBCBDFS.£469
(£50 software and cassette re¬
corder free — while stocks last)
Acorn Electron.£189
Spectrum 48K.£125
Memotech 512.£275
Commodore 64.£189
PRINTERS
Canon PW1080A.£305
Canon PW1080A with RS232
interface.£354
Canon PJ1080A.£399
Canon PW1156A. £380
Epson RX80.£269
Epson RX80FT.£309
Epson FX80.£389
Epson FX100.£520
Epson DX100.£475
Brother CF100.£220
Juki 6100.£375
Brother EP44.£235
Brother HR5.£155
Commodore 1520.£95
Commodore MPS801.£210
Alphacom 32.£59
MCP40 State Micro.£119
WABASH DISKS
5Va" or 8"
SS SD40T.10 for £17
DSSD40T.10 for £20
DSDD40T.10 for £22
DSDD80T.10 for £28
3" Maxell.each £4.50
3 V 2 " Sony.each £4.50
Further discounts for quantity:
10% off 50+; 15% off 100+
All prices include VAT & carriage. Special terms for
export orders. Phone or write for details, quoting
PCW
SM-TEC
AT LAST! BBCBASIC to run on YOUR CP/M
Computer
BBCBASIC(Z80)
Now available for the TORCH and DISKPACK
with full GRAPHICS
WHY STRUGGLE ON using OLD FASHIONED BASICs when you can have ALL
THE ADVANTAGES OF BBCBASIC(Z80) on your computer?
Of course, we can't turn your computer’s video display into a high resolution
colour monitor, but we can give you all the other features of BBCBASIC
including
>L0NG VARIABLE NAMES
>MULTI LINE REPEAT UNTIL STATEMENTS
>MULTI LINE NAMED FUNCTIONS
>MULTI LINE NAMED PROCEDURES
>P0WERFUL DIRECT MEMORY MANIPULATION USING THE
INDIRECTION OPERATORS
>AN IN LINE ASSEMBLER USING STANDARD Z80 MNEMONICS
>VERY SOPHISTICATED PARAMETER PASSING IN THE CALL
STATEMENT
>SERIAL RANDOM AND INDEXED DISK FILES PLUS THE ABILITY
TO ACCESS ANY BYTE IN THE FILE
>CLEAR SCREEN, TAB(X), TAB(X.Y), P0S, VP0S and TIME
Plus ALL THE OTHER STANDARD COMMANDS etc.
You can copy any program written in older standard' versions of BASIC
with little change OR you can write well-structured and easy to read
programs like a professional.
You need never say GOTO again. But we won't stop you.
Price, including postage, £95 + VAT
TORCH version including SOUND and GRAPHICS £110 + VAT
BBCBASIC(Z80) will run on any computer using CP/M 2.2 or later
and a Z80 processor. It comes complete with an instruction manual, a
tutor on file handling and configuration notes.
Trade enquiries welcome
M TEC Computer Services (UK), Ollands Road, Reepham, Norfolk
Telephone Norwich 870620
Prestel Mailbox Nos. 603870620
70 PCW
PRICES THAT’LL
YOU OFF
YOUR FEET!
* Guarantees available
* Wholesale prices!
* Export facilities arranged
* Superb stock of computers and peripherals
* Express delivery
RING 01-947 8562
Official suppliers to the U.K. government departments,
British Telecom and many multi-national organisations.
Apricot 256K 1x315 D/D + Monitor.£1349.00
Apricot 256K 2x315 D/D + Monitor.£1499.00
Apricot 256K 2x720 D/D + Monitor.£1599.00
Apricot 256K 10MB HD D + Monitor.£2379.00
Commodore 64.£152.18
Commodore VIC20 Starter pack.£108.69
Commodore SX 64 (Portable).£609.00
Epson QX10 + RX80 + cable.£1599.00
Epson Portable PX 8.£649.00
Epson Portable PX + RAM.£799.00
Kaypro 2.£1199.00
Kaypro 10MB.£2099.00
Oric Atmos 48K.£145.00
Sanyo MBC555 2x160K D/D + Monitor.£899.00
Sinclair ZX Spectrum 48K.£100.00
Sinclair 2x81. £33.00
Sirius 1 128K 1.2MB.£1650.00
Sirius T 256K 1.2 + 10.6MB.£2950.00
Televideo.PO.A.
Commodore 1701 Colour Monitor.£175.00
Sanyo 2112 Green Screen 15MHZ. £65.00
Sanyo 3125 Col. Med. Res 400PIX.£175.00
Sanyo 3115 Col. V.Hi Res . 800PI .£399.00
Commodore 1541 Disk Drive.£156.52
Oric Disk Drives.£229.00
Sinclair Microdrives. £50.00
Keyboard.£140.00
Sinclair Interface‘1’.£50.00
Commodore C2N Cassette.£35.00
Software: Wordstar.£250.00
Sage Accounts.£295.00
All leading software names available.PO.A.
Tailormade software written by our inhouse software
team.PO.A.
Keyboards, cable, interfaces, tractor feeds, sheet feeds, disks,
software, up grades, listing paper, ribbons, daisy wheels
available for most products.
All prices excluding V.A.T.
Alphacom 32 Printer. £59.99
Brother HR 15. £335.00
Brother HR25. £555.00
Daisy Step 2000 (20CPS). £246.00
Diablo 630 (API).£1320.00
EP 44 Personal Elec. Printer. £195.00
Juki 6100. £335.00
Quen-Data Daisy Wheel Printer. £235.00
Qume 11/40 (RO).£1190.00
Qume 9/45 (RO).£1590.00
Qume Letter Pro 20. £599.00
Richo RP1300. £899.00
Richo RP1600.£1239.00
Smith Corona TP1 Daisy Wheel Printer. . £175.00
Anadex DP 9000 .£799.00
Brother HR5.£130.00
Canon PW1080A (NLQ).£299.00
Commodore MTS 801.£175.00
Commodore 1526 Printer.£250.00
Epson RX80T.£199.00
Epson RX80 F/T.£225.00
Epson FX80.£325.00
Epson RX100 F/T Printer.£345.00
Epson FX100 F/T.£425.00
Mannesmann Tally MT80.£199.00
Mannesmann Tally MT160.£399.00
Mannesmann Tally MT180.£599.00
OKI Microline 82A Printer.£259.00
OKI Microline 83A.£399.00
OKI Microline 92 (P).£399.00
OKI Microline 84 (P).£635.00
Radix 10 (NLQ).£499.00
Seikosha GP100A.£179.00
Seikosha GP100VC.£175.00
Shinwa CP80 F/T .£185.00
Star Gemini 10X.£209.00
Star Delta 10.£319.00
TEC 1550 (P).£469.00
IBM:- Telephone for a quotation on your configurations
Spa House, 11-17 Worple Road, Wimbledon, London SW19 4JS Tel: 01-947 8562 Telex: WOWICO 8955888
PCW71
Don’t chain yourself down trying to sell
a computer system that’s going nowhere.
Set your own limits with Alpha Micro.
Our system can go from one user
to over forty users without changing
software.
It has thousands of software applica¬
tion packages already written to get you
off the ground fast.
And our specs speak for themselves:
68000 32-bit CPU. AMOS: a multi¬
tasking, multi-user operating system.
UNIX’: FORTRAN. BASIC. Pascal.
\
Alpha Microsystems (Great Britain) Limited, Berkshire House, Herschel Street, Slough,
Berkshire . Alpha Microsystems Belgium, Chaussee de la Hulpe 130, Box 14, 1050 Brussels,
Belgium.
AMOS is a registered trademark of Alpha Micro. UNIX is a trademark of Bell Laboratories, c Alpha Microsystems 1984.
COBOL You name it, we’ve got it. Call (0753) 821922.
And we back it all to the hilt with tech- Talk to Alpha Micro,
nical support, training, and an And watch your business take off.
international network of service
centres.
ALPHA MICRO
COMPUTER SYSTEMS
If you have been waiting for printer
prices to fall - THE WAIT IS OVER!!
NEW
LOWER
PRICES
SHINWA CTI CP80
IDEAL FOR
SCREEN DUMPS AND PROGRAM LISTING
The most popular 80 CPS Matrix Printer available
Designed to be Epson compatible, with all
the same features.
* FRICTION & TRACTOR AS STANDARD
* 80 CPS * BI-DIRECTIONAL, LOGIC
SEEKING * TRUE DESCENDERS
* HI-RES BIT IMA GE + BLOCK GRAPHIC
PRINTOUT MODES * SUB & SUPER SCRIPTS
* ITALIC PRINTING * AUTO UNDERLINING
* CONDENSED AND EMPHASISED PRINTING
* EXPANDED AND DOUBLE STRIKE PRINTING
* COMP A CT LIGHTWEIGHT DESIGN
* OPTIONAL INTERFACES FOR SPECTRUM, QL, APPLE
DAISYSTEP 2000 IDEAL FOR QUALITY PRINTOUT
A new low cost, low noise, fully featured Daisywheel Printer.
* WORDSTAR COMPATIBLE * QUME COMPATIBLE RIBBONS AND
DAISYWHEELS * 20 CPS MAXIMUM * 10, 12, AND 15 CHARACTERS
PER INCH * PLATEN LENGTH: 13” * INTERFACE: PARALLEL -
CENTRONICS, OPTIONAL RS232 * WEIGHT: 9.5 kg.
* OPTIONAL INTERFACES FOR SPECTRUM, QL,
APPLE lie, CBM 64
80 cols, 80 cps,
friction/tractor feed,
parallel interface
- FOR
USE WITH
POPULAR
MICRO’S
INCLUDING
BBC, IBM
SIRIUS, APRICOT
ADVANCE 8.6, ETC
THE KEYAKI 100% GUARANTEE
- Full 1 yr. no quibble warranty
- 14 day Money Back Guarantee
-Delivery within 7 days subject to
availability.
Telephone Credit Card Orders welcome.
Personal Collection welcome, Monday
to Saturday - 9.00 am until 7.00 pm.
*Up to £1000 Instant Credit available,
full written details on application.
To: Keyaki Ltd, Enterprise House, 44 Terrace Road,
Walton-on Thames, Surrey KT12 2SD
^ , Please send me .
Shinwa CTI CP80 printers at
£213.85 inc. VAT & £8 Del.
and/or .
Daisystep 2000 printers at
£271.35 inc. VAT & £8 Del.
/ Name
Address .
Postcode
- FOR USE WITH
POPULAR MICRO'S
INCLUDING - BBC, IBM etc
SIRIUS, APRICOT, ADVANCE 8.6, ETC
Telephone.
Tick box for details of Cable/Interface options I I
Tick box for details of Instant Credit up to £1000 I I
LIMITED
Enterprise House, 44 Terrace Road, Walton-on-Thames,
Surrey. KT12 2SD Tel: 09322 42777
/ enclose my_ cheque, no . for £„
Please charge my Access! Bar day card Card No.
Signature..
PCW7
TRADE & EDUCATIONAL ENQUIRIES WELCOME
WgUSmS. AU OOP MTA/SmZP
m MOE7&W/S m?W6
70GEW&, AW/CA/VC&W
• m//vmmpo/z/m/ayr
p/ort/pzmm&AFF
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acooc/a/pmo p0#zr//fivr/A/
TPEGWP Wti/P/PMF
E/£PMm<SE &W?£,
w/7Awr/wmp£p
THE END
OF THE
rAND ALONE
COMPUTER.
/'m AP/mnfvr
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OF 7P& FU7W?f A/F7WFF.
GAM*zm-m/AZcm/EP
$yS7£M0, FAW/mSTAr/OA/
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BU/FP//V FPCCFFSCPO
Computers that can’t network are, today,
a thing of the past.
Future Computers have been designed so
that they can.
You can start off with the powerful FX20
stand-alone computer, and grow from there as
your business grows, simply and cheaply.
Up to now, if you wanted to connect
several computers together so that the users
could talk to each other and share facilities,
such as printers or large memory devices, it
involved an outlay of several tens of thousands
of pounds.
Future Computers have changed all that.
Now these powerful shared facilities are
available for no more than the cost of the
workstations, since Future have the only micros
designed with a built-in networking facility at
no extra cost.
This means that now you can afford to
benefit from a Future network at a fraction of
anything else on the market.
Which is nice to know, even if you’re
starting off with just one.
To Encotel Systems Limited, 7 Imperial Way, Croydon Airport
Industrial Estate, Croydon, Surrey CRO 4RR.
| Please send me information on Future Computers, and free
explanatory brochure on networking and concurrency.
| | I would like to see a demonstration.
Name
Position
Nature of Business
Company
Address
L-
NP3
<:OA\nm;irS The only micro with built-in networking
EARN MONEY FROM
YOUR COMPUTER
* FULL OR PART-TIME.
★ FROM YOUR OFFICE OR YOUR HOME.
Excellent money is now being made. For details send
large S.A.E. to:
HOME COMPUTER EARNERS CENTRE
SOUTHBANK HOUSE,
BLACK PRINCE ROAD,
LONDON SE1 7SJ.
EW! A PRINTER STAND
Printer Stand
• For dot matrix printers
• Raises printer high enough to put
continuous stationery underneath
• Beautifully finished in clear perspex
• Will accept paper up to 12V' wide •
• Viglen quality every time
Non slip rubber pads
Dimensions: 15" (380mm) wide 12V' (320mm) deep 4" (90mm) high
£ 12*95 incvat
Carriage & Packing £3.00
COME TO VIOLEN FOR A FAST, FRIENDLY, PERSONAL SERVICE
To order, complete and send form, or ring
VERONICA, SYLVANA OR CATHY Now on 01-843 9903
- !
Post to: VIGLEN COMPUTER SUPPLIES, UNIT 7, TRUMPERS WAY, HANWELL, LONDON W7 2QA.
Please send me_(qty) PRINTER STANDS at £15.95 each. I enclose Cheque/P.O. for £ __
VIGLEN COMPUTER SUPPLIES or debit my ACCESS/BARCLAYCARD No_
Name.
Signature
Address
made out to
PCW/9/84
76PCW
VALUE ■ VALUE ■ VALUE
APPLE COMPATIBLE PRODUCTS PRINTER INTERFACE CARD CPA 9 £38.00
STAGGERING
VALUE AT
£319.00
+ £47.85 VAT
BASE 64A compatible with Apple cards and
software. Equivalent to Apple II plus with extra 16K
and new Autostart Monitor. Additional features
include ROM based system control program, 64K on
board memory, expandable to 192K. MINI-WRITER
on board in ROM. 24K system memory. Tiny
assembler with assembly and disassembly function.
Upper/lower case. Function commands on
keyboard. Numerical and cursor keypad. Can load
140K diskette program to 192K user RAM.
RS 232 CARD CPA 12 £50.00
DISK DRIVE INTERFACE CPA 6 £38.00
DISKDRIVE CPA 14 £175.00
JOYSTICK CPA 15 £15.00
CABLE CENTRONICS PRINTER CABLE
£12.00
TAXAN HIGH-RESOLUTION COLOUR
MONITOR £399.00
TURNKEY OFFERS
CP80 DOT MATRIX PRINTER 80 CPS
£189.00 +£283s VAT
Various monitors — colour, monochrome and
amber; and printers can be supplied to order at
very competitive prices.
ADD-ONS
80A COLUMN CARD CPA 4
Z80CARDCPA3 £38.00
128KRAM CARD CPA 20 £195.00
16KRAM LANGUAGE CARD CPA 1 £42.00
FORTH CARD CPA 2 £45.00
INTEGER CARD CPA 2A £45.00
EPROM PROGRAMMER CARD CPA 5
£49.00
. .. Base 64 unit with monitor, two slim line disk drives
and disk controller card:
- £715 00+ 110725 vat
£45.00 Base 64 unit with monitor, two slim line disk drives
and controller card, Z80 card and 80 column card,
CP80 printer and controller:
£1040.00 +£1560 ° VAT
PC 301 with colour monitor
£1650.00 +1247 50 VAT
PAL CARD CPA 7
£51.00
PRINTERS AND MONITORS
RITEMAN SLIM PRINTER 120 CPS
£229.00 +134 35 VAT
DAISYSTEP 2000 Daisywheel Printer
£249.00
PHILIPS V7001 12" GREEN MONITOR
£75.00 +£U 25 VAT
l mni
WE HAVE
TAKEN A BYTE
OUT OF THE
PRICE!
'' '• -j.
■/
£1495.00
■I
+ VAT
Not dissimilar to IBM PC, includes 2 x 320K
double sided disk drives. Colour video board and
128K multifunction card, expandable to 256K, with
serial port, parallel port and clock/calendar.
PC 301 includes five expansion slots, keyboard and
MS DOS 210.
DEALER ENQUIRIES
We are main distributors for the Base 64A and the
PC 301. Dealer enquiries are welcome.
TO ORDER
Please telephone order particulars to 01-930 5061
or visit our West End Offices at 58 Jermyn Street,
London SW1Y6LX.
58 JERMYN STREET, LONDON SW1Y 6LX ■ TELEPHONE: 01-930 5061
WOLFCROWN
PHILIPS 14"
COLOUR
TV/MONITOR
£235
TV/Monitor (resolution better
v /a -p than 585 x 450 pixels. Dot-to-
inc VAI dot distance .65mm)
(TV only: £185 inc VAT)
Vifllerv
Plus £8 carriage
and packing
COMPUTE R M SUPPLIES
Personal Service & Quality coupled with Wholesale Prices,
Unit 7 Trumpers Way, Hanwell, London W7 2QA.
Telephone: 01-843 9903.
For special attention to your orders or enquiries concerning
MONITORS, PRINTERS, COMPUTERS, DISC DRIVES,
ring VERONICA, SYLVANA or CATHY on
01-843 9903 NOW or fill in the coupon below.
I-
• Easy to carry • Lightweight • Sparkling picture in seconds • Reliability and
performance excellent • Headphone Socket can also be connected to tape
recorder# Loudspeaker mute switch • Retractable carrying handle
• Metallic silver finish with restful dark picture surround • Includes RGB lead
connecting direct to your BBC Micro. • Philips Model No. 14CT 2006/05T
Post to: VIGLEN COMPUTER SUPPLIES, UNIT 7, TRUMPERS WAY, HANWELL, LONDON W7 2QA.
Please send me _(qty) Philips TV/Monitor at £243 each. I enclose Cheque/P.O. for £_
VIGLEN COMPUTER SUPPLIES or debit my ACCESS/BARCLAYCARD No_
JSm b Signature_
. made out to
Name_
Address,
PCW/9/84
PCW77
SPANISH IMPORTER
AND DISTRIBUTOR
is looking for a good and reliable
exporter of microcomputers and
peripherals (ZX-SPECTRUM, ORIC-
ATMOS, DRAGON, and other popular
micros) in order to import these
goods in parallel with the official
distributors or become the official
distributors in Spain.
We need lowest prices possible
and orders would be in lots of 200 to
2,000 units each shipment monthly,
depending on the models.
Please contact us in writing:
ELECTR0NICA
PO Box 875
Barcelona
SPAIN
£500
CALL
CALL
£240
£276
£200
£340
DOT MATRIX PRINTERS DAISYWHEEL PRINTERS
Epson RX80/RX80FT £220/250
Epson FX80 £330
Epson MX100/FX100 £370/425
Epson interfaces from £27
Logitec FT5000 £239
Shinwa CP80 £175
Riteman £199
Riteman RS232/Tractor £34/24
Toshiba 2100H/
2100G £1280/1495
Seikosha GP250X/
GP700A £185/325
Seikosha GP500A/
550A £155/220
Star Gemini 10X/15X £204/287
Star Delta 10/15 £317/420
Star Radix 10/15 £441/533
Star RS232 l/F £43
Microline 80/82A £165/245
Microline 92(P)/83A £365/395
Canon PW1080A/
PW1156A £282/340
Canon PJ1080A COLOUR £360
Mannesmann MT80/
MT160 £195/390
Microprism £322
Prism 80S/80SGFC £848/1175
Prism 132S/
132SGFC £925/1342
Brother HR1
Brother HR15/HR25
Brother keyboard &
accessories
Daisy Step 2000
Silver Reed EXP 500
Smith Corona TP1
Juki 6100
Juki RS232/Tractor/Sh
feed £50/92/207
NEC 2010/2030 £640
Ricoh RP1300S/
1600S £890/1180
Ricoh Flowriter 1300QD £980
Dyneer DW16(P)/
DW36(P) £272/720
Qumel 1-40/11-55 £1175/1360
Hermes 612C £1500
Diablo 620(RO)/
630(ECS) £670/1680
MONITORS
Zenith 123E 12" Amber
Zenith 13" 135E Colour
Hres
Sanyo DM211212" Green
Sanyo 14" Colour Nres
Microvitec
£85
£372
£67
£161
CALL
REMEMBER: This is only part of our extensive and growing range. If you cannot
see what you want give us a call on 0432 271114!!
Introducing
THE WRITTEN WORD (Software Information Systems) LTD
EDUCATIONAL SOFTWARE & INFORMATION SERVICES FOR THE BBC MICRO.
SOFTWARE FOR THE SERIOUS BUSINESS & HOME USER. WATCH THIS SPACE
Please add VAT at the current rate to all prices. Advertised prices are subject to change
without notice E&OE, and are based on cash with order terms. Next day carriage £6
(+VAT) per box, postage £1.50 on small orders. Telephone to confirm latest prices, large
SAE (22p postage) for price list. Callers by appointment only please. Hours 9-5.30.
GOLDEN VALLEY COMPUTERS LTD
11 Tarsmill Court, Rotherwas Industrial Estate, Hereford HR2 6JZ.
Tel: (0432) 271114
MICROCOMPUTER DEALERS FOR
ALERSFOR PEACHTREE
NEC ®SANYO
PX-8 NOW IN STOCK
EPSOM — Computers and Printers
OX-10 Desktop ♦ RX-80 + CP/M * Word
Processing ♦ Spreadsheet and Mailing List
Manager £1999
HX-20 Portable 16K BASIC Computer £411
PX-8 New Exciting Portable CP M System
PX-8 Portable CP M Computer including Word¬
star. Spreadsheet. Cardbox and Basic
RAM Disk for PX-8 — 129K Data
Special Price if ordered with PX-8
APC Colour Dual Disk
8201A Portable Computer
£2595
£475
£798
emory
£200
TF-20 Dual 340K Disks for HX PX £499
CX-21 Acoustic Coupler 300 BO Re-chargeable
£160
Bar Code Reader for HX'PX £82
LQ1500 200 cps/65 cpt letter quality printer
£1100
FX-80/RX-80/JX-80/HI-80 Printers PHONE
DX-100 13 cps Daisy Wheel Printer £475
SAMY0 — Lowest Priced 16 Bit MS-
DOS, 128 Kb Memory
MBC550 Single Disk. Wordstar. Calcstar £749
MBC555 Dual Disk, Wordstar. Calcstar, Infos
tar. Raportstar £999
NEC — 16 Bit PC with 1M Byte Diskettes
APC Monochrome Single Disk £1735
APC Monochrome Dual Disk £1985
CANON — Fantastic Compact Portable
X-07 Portable 8K BASIC Computer £208
BROTHER
EP-44 Portable Terminal Printer £220
COMMUNICATIONS
Buwbox 300 Bd Modem (Inc PSU) £81
UK 250 10 Memory Telephone £35
BT Hawk Cordless Telephone £147
SOFTWARE
Barcode Reading ROM for HX-20 £50
Barcode Printing Concept
Software HX20/QX 10/PC £95
A wide range ol Business. Bar Code Graphic .
Data Capture and Cdmmumcations Software is
available for the above systems
Telephone for details
SERVICE AND MAINTENANCE
We specialise in the repair of EPSON products
For a modest annual fee you can have all the
benefits of ACTEL's extended warranty including
Securicor both ways for depot repairs and the
use of our telephone HELP line same day
replacement and on site service also available
Write or phone for details
DEMO DEALS: We usually have available at discount with full warranty and support, items
which have been used for demonstrations Please Telephone tor further details
All prices exclude Value Added Tax and Carnage and are sub/ect to revision m accoioance witn Manufacturers
Carnage tree on an pre paid orders'
iems
hStsj
/ \ GENERAL, ACCOUNTS, WP,
\ ELECTRONIC ORDER ENTRY,
/f\vlCk\ GRAPHICS, BAR CODES,
L ---A COMMUNICATIONS
Actel Computers Limited
The Computer Centre, Bugbrooke Road, GAYTON,
NORTHAMPTON NN7 3EU TEL (0604) 858011
78PCW
GALAXIANS—<£7.95
A high-speed machine-code version of the popular
arcade game where the massed space invaders must be
cleared from the skies. After a few seconds they will
begin to swoop and dive at you, showering you with
scatter bombs as they go. The game becomes
progressively more demanding as you kill more and
more of the marauding aliens. Very entertaining —
hours of fun!!! Joy stick or keyboard control.
FIGHTER COMMAND - £6.95
A mission flown completely on instruments where you
are pursuing a fleet of ten enemy aircraft fleeing from
you. They will show on your long range radar screen and
you must manoeuvre your craft to get them within
range of your missiles. If you get too near, they will fire at
you and warp away to safety. You only have one chance
to destroy incoming missiles with your lasers.
Choose your rank in the RAF and you are immediately
sent on a mission to catch and shoot down ten enemy
Mirage jets that are fleeing after their attack on your
airbase. You must manoeuvre your plane to get them in
your gun-sights whilst they are weaving about the sky to
avoid being hit. Limited ammunition and fuel available
so efficiency and accuracy are all important to your
completion of the mission. Promotion for the successful
but poor performances can mean you are asked to leave
the air force. Joy stick or keyboard control.
OVER 100 GAMES,
VARE FOR THE SHARP
\LOGUEAV\ILABLE
ephone (0905) 58351 (24 hrs)
GREEN
OPERATIONAL
LONG RANGE
SENSOR
OVERRIDE
MISSILES 12 I SHIPS DESTROYED 2
[□□iiioial
■IDGIiDli
lilQilill
liS«
i q*bI
< ! v'MS
■■■■mil
' *' ij r w a • yi i ^TiB
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■■ ' ■■ ■■
■ ■
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1 ■
And with his help you may just escape from the
3-D horrors of the 1,000-chamber maze. DRAGON
CAVES is one of over 130 different titles in the free
colour catalogue for Sharp's MZ 700 series computer.
Software for the MZ700 series ranges from the
Don’t worry. He’s on your side.
high-skill dog fighting of FIGHTER COMMAND to
the frightening fun of NIGHTMARE PARK. And
prices start as low as £3.95.
Cut the coupon and get the horrors.
Before they get you.
Sharp Electronics (UK) Ltd., Home Computer Division,
Sharp House, Thorp Road, Newton Heath,
Manchester M10 9BE. Telephone: 061-205 2333
Please send me the FREE Software catalogue for the
SHARP MZ 700 series computer.
Name
Address^
RC.W. SERL
The world of
HAT
j where great ideas come to life.
f
#
The Art of
Daisywheel
Printing y
The new Juki Model 6100 letter quality daisy wheel printer, has
full features you'd expect to find on a more expensive printer.
It can support word processing and graphic functions, print
20 CPS and use a simple drop-in daisy wheel.
The 6100 has 10/12/15 pitch, proportional spacing, utilizes IBM
standard Selectric ribbons, has 2K buffer memory, parallel interface
both tractor feed and serial interface are available as options.
That’s only the beginning - Best of all, the low-noise Juki 6100
is extremely reliable.
You can pay more, but you can't buy better than the Juki 6100.
FEATURES
*20 CPS (max.) print speed
*Bold and shadow printing *Subscripts
and superscripts * Wordstar compatible *Auto
underlining *Diablo protocols *Standard 2K buffer
*1 year parts and labour warranty Comprehensive user
friendly manual * 10, 12 & 15 CPI + proportional spacing
*RRP ex. VAT
micro
Peripheral/ Ud
THE POWER BEHIND THE PRINTED WORD '
69 The Street, Basing, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG24 OBY
Telephone: Basingstoke (0256) 3232 (12 lines)
Telex: 859669 MICROP G Facsimile 0256 61570
^ Call your local dealer NOW for full information on the Juki 6100
Daisywheel Printer or clip this coupon and well send you brochures
and print samples.
Name .
Address .
V
Tel. No.
PC9
ROCK
bottom
PRICES
<2alk&&
m
The UK’s Best Printer Prices
DAISYWHEEL LETTER QUALITY
Smith Corona TP1 (P or S)
Juki 6100 (PI
EPSON DX100
Brother HR15 (P)
PRINTER/TYPEWRITERS
Brother EP22 Dot Matrix (S)
Brother EP44
Silver Reed EX44 Daisy Wheel (S)
DOT MATRIX PRINTERS
Brother HR5
Canon 1080ANLQ
EPSON RX80(P)
EPSON RX80FTCP]
EPSON FX80 (P)
EPSON RXIOOFT(P)
EPSON FXIOOFT(P)
EPSON LQ1500
Seikosha GP100A (P)
Seikosha GP50A (P)
Seikosha GP50S (Spectrum)
Seikosha GP500A CP)
Seikosha GP550A (P)
Seikosha GP700A Colour (P)
Shinwa CT80 (P)
(P)=Parallel-Centronics (S)=Serial RS232
£189.00 +VAT =
E335.00 +VAT-
£369 00 + VAT=
£335 00 +VAT=
El 19 00 + VAT =
El 89 00 + VAT=
£339.09 + VAT=
E 129.00 +VAT =
£289.00 + VAT=
£195 00 +VAT=
£219 00 +VAT=
£324 00 + VAT=
£339 96 +VAT-
£425.00 + VAT =
£925 00 + VAT=
El29 90 + VAT =
£79 90 +VAT-
E79.90 +VAT =
E 139.90 +VAT=
El 79 90 + VAT=
£279 90 + VAT =
El 75 00 + VAT=
£217.35
£385 25
£424 35
£385.25
£136.85
£217.35
£389 95
£148.35
£322.35
£224.25
£251.85
£372.60
£390 95
£488.75
£1063 75
£149.39
£91.89
£91.89
£160.89
£206.89
£321.89
£201.25
INSTANT CREDIT Up to credit terms,
f" ms over £150 Monthly
n noL Deposit Plus 12, c. a |i ers subject to sta
SUPERDISKS
LONDON'S LOWEST PRICES ON FLOPPY DISKS
Prices per box of ten ex VAT
SSOD
DSOD
SS96TP1
DS96TP1
40TR
40TR
80TR
BOTR
BASF 5 Vi"
£ 10.95
£ 10.20
£ 19.00
£ 22.50
SCOTCH 5 Vi"
£ 13.55
£ 19.50
£ 20.05
£ 24.00
VERBATIM 5V
£ 15.50
£ 23.50
£ 22.50
£ 30.50
DYSAN 5V
£ 16.80
£ 24.90
£ 24.90
£ 32.00
TDK 5V
£ 17.50
£ 25.50
—
£ 33.00
SONY 3V
£ 37.50
—
—
12” MONITORS - GREEN SCREEN
Sanyo 2112 Med Res
Sanyo 8112 High Res
14” MONITORS - COLOUR
Commodore 1701 Composite/Sound
Fidelity CM 14 RGB/Comp/Sound
Microvitec 1431 MS Norm Res RGB
Microvitec 1431MZ forZX Spectrum
Microvitec 1451 MS Med Res RGB
Microvitec 1451MQ for Sinclair QL
Microvitec 144IMS High Res RGB
Sanyo 3125 Norm Res RGB
Sanyo 3117 Med Res RGB
Sanyo 3115 High Res RGB
Commodore
1541 DISK DRIVE including
EASYSCRIPT W.P
Commodore 64
C2N Cassette
801 Tractor Printer
802 Friction Tractor Printer
1520 Colour Printer Plotter
1701 Colour Monitor
Simons Basic ROM
Easyscnpt W P Disk
Petspeed Compiler Disk
SX64 Ftortable inc FREE Software and 801 Pnnter
Atari
600XL16K
800XL64K
1010 Cassette
SANYO MBC 555 Business Computer
128K including Wordstar. Calcstar, Infostar
BBC
BBC Model B me Cassette deck and 4 programs
Disk Interface Kit
Model B me Disk I F
Cumana 1 x 100K DD CSX100
Cumana 1 x200K DD CSX200
Cumana 2x100K DO me PSU
Cumana 2x200K DD me PSU
Cumana 2x400K DD me PSU
All above Cumana Disk Drives include Cable. Manual h
Microvitec 14" RGB Monitor
Wbrdwise W P ROM
Torch Z80 Disk Pack
Acorn Electron
Sinclair
Spectrum 48K + 2 Free Games (worth Ell)
Microdnve
Interface I
Spectrum 48K me 2 FREE Games
Alphacom Printer
Kempston Printer I F
Kempston Joystick I F
16K-48K Upgrade
El 73 00 + VAT =
El 79 00 + VAT =
£173 00 +VAT-
El99 00 + VAT =
£269.00 +VAT =
E279 00 + VAT =
E379 00 + VAT =
£173.00 +VAT =
£285 00 + VAT =
E399 00 + VAT =
El 73 87 + VAT =
£160 82 + VAT=
£32 61 + VAT =
£165.17 + VAT =
£260 83 + VAT =
£86 90 +VAT =
£173 00 + VAT =
£39 09 +VAT-
£60 83 + VAT =
£39 09 + VAT =
£691 30 +VAT=
£121.69 +VAT =
£199 95 + VAT =
£39 09 +VAT=
£198 95
£205 85
£198.95
£228.85
£309.35
£320 85
£435 85
£198 95
£327.75
£458.85
£199 95
£184.95
£37.50
£189 95
£299 95
£99 95
£199.00
£44.95
£69.95
£44.95
£795.00
£139.95
£229.95
£44.95
£899 00 + VAT = £1034.00
£339 09 + VAT=
£71 26 +VAT=
£399 96 + VAT-
£126.00 +VAT =
£191 26 +VAT =
£321 70 + VAT=
£347 78 +VAT =
£434.74 + VAT=
form, disk
£173.00 + VAT =
£34 74 +VAT =
£695 60 + VAT =
£167 78 +VAT =
£106 91 + VAT
£41 30 +VAT -
£41 30 +VAT =
£104 30 +VAT -
£48.65 + VAT =
£39 08 +VAT-
£15 61 + VAT-
£21 70 +VAT-
£389.95
£81.95
£459.95
£144.95
£219.95
£369 95
£399.95
£499.95
£199.95
£39 95
£799 95
£192.95
£122.95
£47.50
£47.50
£119.95
£55 95
£44.95
£17.95
£24.95
Mail Order ♦ Export +Trade
Hot Line Phone 01-686 6362
I Delivery by Secuncor (3 day) please add £5.00 per item.
1 Delivery by T.N.T. (overnight) please add £9.50 per item
Send off the coupon or order by ’phone quoting your Access,
Barclaycard No. 'Phone 01 -686 6362. Immediate
despatch on receipt of order or cheque clearance.
Add 50p for PSP per box of 10 disks
CASH S CARRY COMPUTERS
3 Eden Walk, Precinct,
Kingston-Upon-Thames, Surrey.
Tel: 01-546 8974
These prices correct until superceeded by next advertisement
To Cash & Carry Computers. FREE POST, Croydon. CR9 9EB
Tel 01 -686 6362 Telex 946240 Attn 19001335
Please supply_
I enclose my cheque for £_
.including delivery by Securtcor/TN T *
or charge my Access/Barclaycard No_
Name_
Signature-
•Please Delete
PCW9
PCW83
Fantastic savings on a wide range
of printers, monitors and accessories from Teleprinter
Equipment, one of the UK's largest distributors of computer
peripherals. All fully supported by engineering services nationwide.
NEC PC-8023 BEN Printer
Qume Sprint II:
Worlds Most Reliable Daisy
40 cps + Choice of RS232,
Centronics, IEEE-488 and IBM PC
Interchangeable RRP Sale Price
Interfaces £1577 £1495*
GE 3014 PC Printer
Microprism
110 cps + Near Letter Quality
84 x 84 dpi Graphics
Text Justification and Proportional
Spacing
RRP Sale Price'
£399 £359
EXP 55016 cps Daisywheel Printer
RRP Sale Price
£675 £450
Qume Letter Pro 20 Printer
20 cps Daisy + Wordstar Compatible
10,12,15 Pitch + Proportional Spacing
RRP Sale Price
£744 £699*
The original Apple Monitor
renowned for long life and reliability
24 x 80 Character Display
High resolution 18 MHz bandwidth
Medium resolution 15 MHz bandwidth
BMC Swiveller Monitor Stand
Sale
RRP Price
£109 £95
£89 £69
£18 £15
120 cps + Graphics
Pica and Elite Typestyles
Friction Feed + Adjustable Tractor
RRP Sale Price
£395 £329
Logitek FT 5000 Printer
100 cps + Graphics
Friction Feed + Adjustable Tractor
Pica and Elite Typestyles
RRP Sale Price
£299 £249
Triple Mode: Draft, Memo and
Excellent Letter Quality up to 160 cps
18x9 Matrix
RS232 + Parallel Interfaces
RRP Sale Price
£1068 £995
BMC 12" Monitors (Green)
Prism 80 Column Printer
Draft or WP Quality + 200 cps
24 x 8 Staggered Matrix
250 Sheet Hopper Option
RRP Sale Price
£1054 £843*
Prism 132 Column Colour Printer
Produces 144 Colour Shades
High Resolution 84 x 84 dpi Graphics
Lotus 1,2,3 Compatible
RRP Sale Price
£1584 £1267*
Gallid Universal Printer Stand
Paper Bargains
RRP Sale Price 2000 Sheets, II "x 1 4 / 2 " Listing Paper £18.10
£85 £70 2000 Sheets. II" x 9 Vi' Listing Paper £15.62
Please add £10.00 for Packing and Delivery +15% VAT. Rental from £15.00 per month for printers. Please call for full details.
DEALER ENQUIRIES WELCOME * Ex-Demonstration Stock.
Prices correct at time of going to press and may be subject to change without notice
Teleprinter Equipment Ltd.
64-82 Akeman Street, Tring, Herts. HP23 6AJ. Telephone: Tring (0442 82) 4011/5551
Telex: 82362 BATECO G Cables: RAHNO TRING.
84PCW
KNIGHTS UNBEATABLE SHARP DEALS
DEAL 721 + 4 £215 76K MZ-700 with built-in cassette plus
£150 worth of software including FOUR computer languages —
BASIC, PASCAL, FORTH and MACHINE CODE.
PLUS 50 programs to get you off to a flying start including: Teach
Division, Teach Music, Statistical Analysis, Regression Curve
Fitting, Cribbage, Poker, Cosmic, Puckman, Vicious Viper, Circus
Star, Mastermind, Suicide Run, Exploding Atoms, Budget Forecast¬
ing Accounts etc, and our special BASIC Tutorial.
DEAL 731 + 4 £326 MZ-700, cassette, languages & programs
as above with the 4 colour printer/plotter built in. Best value in
computers. Why buy a slow micro that is stuck in BASIC with no
printer or cassette?
Latest 700 news — Sharp 534K dual floppy £499
32K CMOS battery powered RAM £149
Double slot expansion unit £89
WE HAVE SOLD THOUSANDS OF SHARP PRODUCTS
ALL OVER THE WORLD DURING THE LAST 9 YEARS
AND HAVE NEVER CHARGED FOR A SINGLE REPAIR.
WE GUARANTEE TO BEAT ANY COMPETITORS’ PRICE
ON THE SPOT.
Export customers — prices are free on board Aberdeen — no
VAT. UK customers get free delivery but remember to add
VAT.
108 ROSEMOUNT PLACE,
ABERDEEN AB2 4YW
Telephone: 0224 630526
Telex: 739169 “KNIGHTS TV”
DUCKWORTH
HOME COMPUTING
ADVANCED BASIC & MACHINE CODE FOR THE 64
by Peter Gerrard
For the more serious user of the Commodore 64, this book teaches you all
about programming in Machine Code, with sections on double precision
arithmetic and animation, along with a series of chapters on using the special
features of the Commodore 64.
The all-important link to Basic is not forgotten, and the opening chapters form
a guide to improving your Basic programming techniques, along with many
program examples. Peter Gerrard, former editor of Commodore Computing
International, is author of Using the 64 and a regular contributor to Personal
Computer News, Which Micro? and Software Review and Commodore
Horizons. £6.95
40 BEST MACHINE CODE ROUTINES FOR THE 64
by Mark Greenshields
Provides 40 excellent machine code routines which can be incorporated into
both Basic and machine code programs. The routines include useful utilities,
such as the following. Print at: no more need for those weird cursor symbols!
Move: move an area of memory to another area. Pause: stop a listing at any
time by pressing the shift key. Function keys: program the function keys.
Copy: copy any part or all of the character ROM into RAM. Doke: POKE a 16
bit number into memory. Deek: PEEK the 16 bit number. List alter: list
programs in any width to screen or printer. Old: recover a NEWed program.
Invert: invert all or part of the high res screen. Organ: play music while
running another program. Scroll message: scroll a message across the screen
while running another program. Flash characters: put flashing text on the
screen. Split screen: divide the screen into text and high res. Sound: make
sounds easily without pokes. Envelope: allow complex sounds to be created
without pokes. A listing of Extramon is also included. Mark Greenshields is
the author of Mastering the Commodore 64 and Mastering Machine Code
on the 64, and a regular contributor to Your 64. £5.95
Write in for a full descriptive catalogue (with details of cassettes).
Qb SEE US ON
^■iMil STAND 746
AT THE
PCW SHOW
DUCKWORTH
The Old Piano Factory, 43 Gloucester Crescent, London NW1 7DY
Tel: 01-485 3484
THE HR1 THE FINEST PRINTER/TYPEWRITERS MONEY CAN BUY.
CROWN RANIER - The leader ot all interfaced daisy wheel printer/typewriters Here's why
THE CROWN RANIER
ONLY £795 +VAT
Only £595 + VAT
TheHRI
Bi-directional - 17 CPS - some
features as below, but without
keyboard and lift off facility.
Compatible with
SHARP
OSBORNE
APPLE II
APPLE III
TELEVIDEO
TANDY
BBC
MINI
TEXAS 30/30
PET
HEWLETT PACKARD
SUPERBRAIN
SIRIUS
XEROX
IBM
The unbeatable Crown Ramer is the only heavy duty daisy wheel printer/typewriter which runs on a linear motor - no belts or cables to break, stretch or wear - and uses the IBM ribbon and lift off correctors
The reliability has become legend in these days of expensive electronic typewriter breakdowns
INTERFACES CENTRONIC - IEEE - RS232 - FULL KSR (Keyboard send and receive) at small extra charge - no external boxes - interchangeable daisywheels - variable pitch - three free daisy wheels
- automatic whole line correction - easily copes with standard printed forms - 135,000 characters per ribbon (at least twice the average character length) - standard lift oft correctors - a
printer/typewriter at the flick of a switch
Perfection as a typewriter (now used by local authorities and multi-nationals), perfection as a printer
Beware of lightweight, low cost machines - these can never give long term reliable service THIS MACHINE WILL!! The professional machine
Ask you local computer or office equipment dealer for further information EX STOCK DELIVERY
SOLE UK DISTRIBUTOR. TRADE ENQUIRIES INVITED
BUSINESS CENTRE
56-58 SOUTH ST., EASTBOURNE,
SUSSEX. (0323) 639983.
PCW 85
This is no game
This could be your reality
With a GLOBEL no quibble guarantee* the answer is
YES!
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86PCW
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NEWSPRINT
/
Drifting back
into reality
The Imagine directors
themselves had given up
hope of preserving the
company when this edition
went to press — and what had
been Britain's best-known
micro software company
looked set for collapse.
But what a sad, sorry mess
it was!
For a start, nobody involved
seemed inclined to tell more
than a little truth at a time.
SfranfifefifQ/nflfs-onaf/mafif/neSoft^are/iave leftthat^ompanym
financial turmoil butoverjn tjie US^ Osborne has decided^ to 'come
clearVi Meanwhile with Los Angeles embroiled in the 'Big Event',
theofficial Olympicsupplier's trackrecordjs notas honestas it
sshouldjae^llthisanc^^
This was not to say that they
spoke little — far from it. I
endured long and bitter
speeches from various
directors of Imagine, detailing
the amazing deceit of each
other.
Naturally, the person who
was speaking was always
innocent of any evil.
Now: what actually
happened?
Nobody denies that
Imagine ran out of cash. The
question is: Who spent it?
And on what?
Most reports which you
might have read will have
emphasised the 'high living'
aspects of the Liverpool whizz
The latest public appearance of aspiring micro ventriloquist
Arthur 'gottle-a-geer' Trick (andZynar's generalmanager)
shows that he still hasn't quite worked out where all the
moving parts are (oris his right hand looking for that elusive
glass of milk?). However; on a more serious note, justwhen
itwas starting tolookas though Zynar was going toloseout
to its networking rival, 3Com, the company has found new
hope and aspiration from IBM's decision to opt out of
networks for two years.
Man y people had expected an official blessing from IBM
on one or another network technology, and Microsoft
actually went on record late last year as saying thatitwould
wait for that announcement before making its own mindup.
Trick, however, is very pleased (or at least, saysheisjthat
IBM has announced merely a proposed s ystem.
'That proposed system bears a very close resemblanceto
man y elements oftheArcnetcoax cabling system that we
currently use for our Plan series of networks, 'says Trick.
'This means that we can easily adapt ours to be fully
compatible with IBM's, 'he added happily
Well, it's one thing to say the word 'easily'and anotherto
doit. To help boost credibility. Trick has announced his
half-year results at the same time, showing sales of£1.6
million for the past six months—with las t year's twelve
month sales being only£1.4million.
Apparently there are now400Zynar networks sold in
Europe and Britain.
kids. Lotus cars, Ferraris,
superbikes, and other badges
of lavish spending featured in
the 'hype' of Imagine before
its crash — so it wasn't
surprising to see all these
tales revived afterwards.
There was the Marshall
Cavendish deal, of course.
That should have got Imagine
out of a lot of trouble — it
involved a publishing
venture. It gave Imagine a
contract, for which it received
a £200,000 plus advance, to
write games, which Marshall
Cavendish would give away
with its computer partwork.
What happened then,
according to Imagine people,
was that the original idea was
improved on. 'Originally, we
had to produce simple games,
but then Marshall Cavendish
insisted on playtesting them
to the sort of high standards
that we would have required
for our own top quality
commercial games,' said
Bruce Everiss, then marketing
chief.
According to this version of
events. Imagine eventually
got the games (including the
game launched as Pedro) up
to top scratch — but found
that all the money had been
used up doing that — and
there were still other games
to do under the contract.
So Imagine told the world
that Pedro (and others
designed for Marshall
Cavendish) would be the
best-ever games from
Imagine, and launched them.
And a deal was agreed with
Marshall Cavendish that the
money would be paid back on
instalments over a year or so.
If Pedro was the best game
ever from Imagine, the
general public failed to
appreciate it — as both
Marshall Cavendish and
Imagine were left out of
pocket.
Where was all the money
going, then?
According to everybody
inside the company, without
exception or dissent, the
problem was software
counterfeiting. And the
solution was the Megagame.
Counterfeiting is not piracy.
Piracy is when I get a game,
and make a copy for you, and
swap it for one which you got,
without asking you where you
got it.
Counterfeiting is when
somebody makes a cheap
perfume and puts it in a
Chanel bottle, and sells it
through High Street chemists.
Counterfeiting is when you
make your own tape
cassettes, and print your own
inlay card, and then sell to the
normal software distributors
at less than half price, so that
the shop manager doesn't
even know that most of his
stocks are fakes.
The Megagames include
extra memory in ROM and
RAM, and if they ever appear,
will be almost like little
computers on their own,
together with instructions
which are really short novels.
You are supposed to really
live these games and, by all
accounts, they are good.
One plugs into the
Commodore 64, and the other
into the Spectrum.
And they will cost £40 each.
The story from Imagine is
that it needed big revenues to
support the research for the
Megagames. And because of
counterfeiting, the company
suddenly stopped selling its
normal cassettes.
The other story from (some
of) Imagine's directors is that
one of their number was out
to sabotage sales, and
weaken the company to the
point where he could buy it
for a song from the receiver.
The other, other story from
(other) Imagine directors
suggests that the sabotage
story is nonsense, a
smokescreen put out to cover
directors' fees of £40,000 a
year plus directors wives' fees
of £10,000 a year, plus
company-paid credit card
spending of £5000 a month.
In researching this story, I
have had to listen to
'confidential' comments from
some of Imagine's directors,
telling stories of others
standing outside their houses
talking to their super-cars for
two hours; of other directors
parking their cars out in the
country so that the bailiffs
wouldn't seize them; of lies
told to possible financial
backers about bank loans
which didn't exist, of trouble
stirred up among creditors to
90PCW
Fans of Mouse Corporation's optical mouse will be
fascinated by this illustration of something (apparently)
called a SummaMouse, from Summagraphics.
It is the same mouse, and you can plug it into computers
without mice, in the same way.
What is different about the SummaMouse is the way it
sends data to the host micro. Mouse Corporation had
planned to send more information to the computer than it
does, and ended up duplicating X and Y co-ordinates.
Summagraphics has cut down a lot of the duplication.
End-user sales are through Rapid Terminals, at around
£300.
persuade them that the
money Imagine owed them
would never be paid (so that
the creditors would wind up
the company) and of attempts
to 'poach' staff to start rival
companies.
Frankly, I didn't even try to
make up my mind who was
telling the truth.
Even the police, who I know
were looking into a previous
episode in Imagine's history
at press time, would have
trouble finding evidence to
support half these tales.
The final chapter in the
story of Imagine itself was
probably written when three
directors set up a new
company, an off-the-shelf
creation of the company's
accountants (say the
directors) which would buy
the Megagames from
Imagine, paying off the debts,
and letting them get on with
the future.
The minority stockholder
and one of the directors were
not included in this deal. And
they didn't regard their side of
the bargain as attractive —
and (by coincidence,
perhaps?) shortly after the
deal was signed, voices of
dissent began to be heard
outside Imagine.
At that time, Ian
Hetherington and David
Lawson had flown off to
Silicon Valley to raise funds
for Finchspeed — the new
company, which, of course,
had no funds — so that it
could buy Imagine's assets.
Time, they found, was not
available. Offers of finance,
and big finance (they tell me)
were immediately
forthcoming from venture
backers of software houses
there — but it would have
taken three months to
arrange.
They struck lucky with Atari,
which offered to pay (an
unspecified sum) for the US
rights to the Megagames. It
would, insists Dave Lawson,
have saved Imagine — but the
day they were due to go in to
sign the deal was the day that
the news broke of Jack
Tramiel's takeover of Atari
computer (for more on this
particular turn of events see
'The Pied Piper of Atari takes
his revenge').
Tramiel froze all deals
instantly.
Since all the top people
immediately started leaving
Atari, I know of no way of
checking this tale.
The last I heard of Lawson,
he was agreeing that without
the Atari money things didn't
look good, and Imagine
would only go ahead when
somebody bought it as a
going concern from the
receiver.
The last I heard from
Imagine, it was the
switchboard operator.
'There's nobody here, and the
bailiffs have taken all the
furniture,' she said.
That evening, I heard
from Eugene Evans,
superprogrammer at Imagine,
and dinner companion of
Margaret Thatcher. There was
no problem, he assured me.
'Where are you all
working?' I asked. 'In
Tithebarn House,' he replied,
sounding puzzled. 'Though
we are working from home a
lot.'
If he didn't know what was
going on, how are the rest of
us supposed to guess?
Sanyo’s Olympic
‘code of honour’
I was very entertained to be
assured by a UK importer of
the Sanyo that Adam Osborne
was not telling the truth, and
that the Sanyo really is
IBM-compatible.
Adam, in his book (see
'Osborne: the whole truth')
dropped a wicked aside about
Sanyo.
He tells how he went to
Japan at one stage, and was
shown the machine, which
uses an Intel 8088 central chip
(just like the IBM).
Asked what the machine's
chances in the US market
would be, Osborne told
Sanyo To succeed in the US,
it must be IBM-compatible.'
And, he recalls: 'So it was.
Not that they changed it —
they merely announced that it
was IBM-compatible, on the
strength of the 8088 chip.'
One small thing puzzled
me: shortly after the Sanyo
dealer assured me that
Osborne was fibbing, I ran
into him at a software
distributor's party.
He wasn't talking to me. He
was addressing the
distributor. He said: 'We must
get together for sure, and you
have to start doing versions of
your software for the Sanyo.'
And this forceful salesman
insisted: 'The Sanyo is selling
in big, big volume now, and
you are missing an
opportunity.'
The distributor in question,
Softsel, has vast stocks of IBM
software.
Let us ignore the question
of what 'big, big volume'
really means, in terms of
dozens per month. Let us ask
a simple question : If the
Sanyo is compatible with the
IBM, what's this need for
'versions of the software to
run on Sanyo' deal, then?
Goingfora
smooth edge
Adam Osborne reckons he
made a bad mistake in hiring
a Consolidated Foods man,
Robert Jaunich, to run his
computer company.
Apple, on the other hand,
reckons it did the smart thing
in hiring a drinks company
man, John Sculley of Pepsico,
where (unlike Osborne, which
crashed) things aren't going
too badly.
Well, that's simplifying it a
lot, but it does explain why
industry watchers are so very
interested in what happens at
Apple here in the UK.
The symptoms are: Apple
UK has been doing
reasonably well selling
micros; but Apple France has
done nearly six times better.
These figures were
analysed back in Cupertino,
and, shortly thereafter, top
people began disappearing
from Apple UK.
First came the departure of
the marketing manager, Keith
Hall, leaving his close friends
in little doubt that he
preferred to run a more
enterprising company, and
one where local expertise was
Torch micros have always boasted automatic
communications (originally to Prestel) and the newer
ones, based on the 68000 supermicro family, didn't have
them when launched.
Now they do: the box shown has been given BT
approval for connection to the public phone system.
Details of these Unix-based communicators on (0223)
841000.
PCW91
NEWSPRINT
Taking the BBC Micro one step closer to the Apple in its
design concept XCalibur has announced an expansion
bus for the beast.
This expansion isn't just a philosophical similarity: the
expansion bus will actually take Apple II cards. The idea
isn't obvious — unless, of course, you are XCalibur; which
makes a lot of expansion boards for the Apple, and can't
sell them because there aren't so many Apple users.
All XCalibur Apple boards are, need one add, not only
compatible with this expansion bus, but documentation
on how to link them into BBC Basic is included with the
expansion backplane.
Price (naked, without power supply or box, as shown)
will be £200 — with a box and power source, it will
'probably' be about £260, the company says.
Details on (0604)21051.
valued. Hisfriendssay he
didn't much enjoy being told:
'Ignore Sinclair, ignore BBC
Micro sales, stuff the market
research; your job is to push
the Apple lie as a home
micro.'
Then the managing
director, Peter Cobb,
beginning with a fine set of
speeches about the potential
that the lie had in the home
market, saw his own
departure announced.
His replacement is not a
food company man, nor a
drinks company man. Nor, for
that matter, is he a managing
director.
What he is, is someone with
vast experience of the razor
blade business. He comes
from Gillette.
And he has been appointed
general manager — which
means that, in the eyes of
industry watchers (like me),
the UK board has been
downgraded.
The new man, David
Hancock, will find his choices
somewhat limited.
If he wants to please
Cupertino, he will mount a
huge marketing campaign,
with expensive TV
advertising, powerful trade
promotions, and marvellous
incentives for software
houses to convert UK games
for the Apple lie.
He will then find that the lie
may cost 'only a little more
than a BBC Micro with two
diskettes' but that ignorant
UK purchasers perversely buy
BBC Micros (and Spectrums,
QLs, Amstrads and
Commodore 64s) because
they haven't got enough cash
to buy an Apple lie with two
diskettes. Actually, they can't
even afford a BBC with two
diskettes. The diskettes they
save up for, and buy next
year.
Alternatively, he will argue
that the strong user base of
Commodore 64, BBC and
Sinclair Spectrum sales
makes it necessary to sell the
Apple lie and lie (the portable)
into the business market,
where it is quite strong
already.
I suspect, if he does that, he
will be told to get on with the
job, and stop teaching his
grandmother.
If he could drop the price of
the lie down to £400, of
course, his troubles would be
over on the sales front,
because the Apple is really
quite a nice micro, and there's
loads of US software to run
on it. Not as cheap as the sort
of software that you can run
on the BBC Micro, mind you,
but cheap all the same.
But if he tried that,
Cupertino would stop him.
Not only is France (no BBC
Micro, no Spectrum, just Oric
and something funny from
Thomson CSF) managing
without cutting prices, but
worse, the US is too.
The shape of the dollar
(very strong) against the
pound (very weak) means
simply that if Hancock cut the
lie to £400, it would be
cheaper for American buyers
to get their Irish-built Apples
from the UK, than to buy them
in the US.
A reverse grey import
business! Could this happen?
No. Do not expect price cuts
of more than about 5 per cent
in the lie and lie range.
IBM upstaged on
home ground
One of the many exhibitions
which occur around the
hay-fever time of year is a
newish one called the PC User
Show. It is aimed exclusively
at the world of the IBM micro.
Its only real attraction was
the fact that it wasn't a PC
user show at all, and should
have been called the 'PC
Rivals Show'.
Of the new products on
show, most were new only to
UK users, and have been out
for months and months in the
US, where the IBM PC is more
of a religion than a user
community.
The rest was so ordinary as
to be soporific.
For examples of the rivals:
ITT (wearing its STC label)
was demonstrating the Xtra.
That is an IBM lookalike which
everybody in the US got very
excited about last November
when it was announced.
Everyone in the trade, that is
— not everyone in the street.
And despite
important-sounding
announcements from ITT
both in the US and here, it is
clear that while dealers were
delighted to have the Xtra as a
stick with which to beat IBM
('Give us more discount or
we'll stock the Xtra'), the
public was quite happy to
carry on buying the real thing.
At the Show, ITT's stand
was remarkable for one thing:
the fact that the designers had
been told 'Do what you like,
as long as you eclipse IBM's
stand.'
They had: they'd virtually
hidden it. And IBM wasn't
amused.
Nor was IBM very taken
with the ACT stand (not a
Rascal to be seen, just
Apricots on one side, and
Pulsar software running on
Apricots and IBMs on the
other) because ACT too, had
eclipsed it.
Worse, ACT had taken two
stands, one on each side of
the aisle, and had then
illegally linked them together
with a bit of raised red carpet,
on which the company had
erected a shrine to its British
Microcomputing Awards 1984
trophy.
IBM objected to the
annexation of a hundred
The picture of a printed circuit board on the case of the
new 'computer tape' from Agfa is meant to reassure you
that the contents are 'high tech'.
Apart from that, feel free to ignore all implications in
Agfa's marketing sales pitch that this tape is somehow
'better' than another tape cassette — the requirements of
hi-fidelity audio are no less exacting than those of
computer users.
If you use back-of-lorry cape, you may have trouble.
Otherwise, tape which can record sounds will record
computer sounds, and any problems you have are more
likely to be the result of the cassette recorder than the
tape.
But at least Agfa has produced this in fifteen minute
chunks, seven and a half minutes per side, which is handy
for most home computer programs.
92PCW
At last: a real Ceefax and Oracle reader for your Spectrum.
You can read me (Oracle channel 4, page 557) and look at
the BBC's Micro software for the BBC Micro, even if you
have a Spectrum. And all for only £145!
Does it download Spectrum software?
Well , no, not yet. There is some Spectrum code on
Ceefax, at last. But this black box won't pull it down and
load it. Not at least until a new ROM chip hits the market
to upgrade this to do the job.
The builders, OEL Ltd , say this ROM will be available
'shortly'. I'll let you know when I see one.
Details on (0768) 66748.
square feet of passageway,
and got ACT to take it down
and hide it behind the
software, muttering angrily to
the organisers about: 'What is
ACT doing at an IBM show,
anyway?'
Osborne showed an
Osborne with an IBM
keyboard and IBM lookalike
circuitry, for which it didn't
have a price yet. There was
also the Encore, and a thing
called the Polo, produced by
the same Radofin company
which gave us the wildly
successful Aquarius home
micro for a few months last
year, through Mattel. The only
surprising thing about the
Polo is that you get a Z80 with
your MS-DOS machine, and
get printer and colour monitor
for your £3000.
Another rival to shock us
came from Ferrari Software,
selling its Chameleon, which
is actually an old Seequa
Chameleon.
Ho hum, so much for the
rivals.
Enthusiastic praise from
enthusiasts directed me to a
word processor, reputed to be
the nicest ever.
It turned out to use
standard screen 'escape
sequences' for display. For
those who have never used a
remote terminal, this means
that instead of just putting the
character in the fifth row,
fourteenth column of a
screen, the computer has to
send a series of instructions
to tell the remote terminal to
go to the top of the screen,
then go down five rows, then
move fourteen columns.
Since the remote terminal
exists only in the mind of the
computer, it then has to run
another complicated piece of
software which interprets
these escape sequences and
translates them into the part
of memory where it actually
holds the fifth row, fourteenth
column.
It all takes time, this
software, and the result is that
you can spend several
seconds waiting for the whole
page to rewrite itself.
The advantage of this sort
of software is that it will work
on virtually any computer that
understands standard escape
sequences.
This is poor compensation
for the drawback — which is
that the software is not worth
having, whatever computer
you use. It is easy to learn to
use, but once learned, is it
worth using?
All too much of the UK stuff
at the Show was of this
calibre.
The lesson, perhaps, is that
IBM (like Apple before it) has
overestimated its ability to
dominate the UK market
simply on the basis of
dominating the US market.
When the IBM PC was
released, over a year ago in
the UK, PCW commented at
the time that you'd be a mug
to buy one, because there was
nothing to run on it. But (we
went on) in a year's time,
you'd be a mug not to buy
one.
In fact, you can still find
quite a lot of UK software
which is written first for the
Sirius, and only then
converted for the IBM. And
you can find a very great deal
of wonderful US software
which is hard to get here,
inadequately supported, and
not entirely suitable for UK
use.
There are people inside IBM
who will tell you that they
never planned to 'dominate
the market' anyway, and are
quite happy, thank you, just to
make an inordinate profit on
every PC sold. And they do
sell a lot— all they can make,
in fact.
But that can't disguise the
fact that the company has
been very successful in the
US, and less successful here.
and any theory which doesn't
accept that is an excuse.
Osborne: the
whole truth
Adam Osborne has been
telling lies to the press.
He reveals this in a book,
which tries to analyse why
Osborne Computer
Corporation collapsed,
suddenly and dramatically,
just at the point where it
looked ready to take over the
world.
The gist of the book is one
which, he is perfectly awafe,
could take him straight into
the libel courts— in fact he
starts the book off with a letter
from the lawyer of the man
named as a possible culprit.
That man is Robert Jaunich
— the man Adam himself
brought in from Consolidated
Foods to become president of
his company.
Osborne did not go bust,
says Adam, because of
pre-announcing a machine
called the Executive. That
story is one which he told the
Wall Street Journal and me,
and many other journalists,
knowing it to be false, a year
ago.
'It was the only time I have
knowingly misled the press,'
Osborne says in his book.
Hypergrowth: a study of the
rise and fall of Osborne
Computer Corporation.
Osborne's theory is simple,
if at first incredible.
He believes that the new
president might have wanted
to buy a larger part of the
corporation's stock than he
was entitled to under his
contract.
And one way of doing that,
says Adam, would be to take
decisions which made the
company appear to be barely
capable of making it through
the year.
He could then watch the
share price drop through the
floor, pick up the shares for a
song, and turn the company
round. 'He would appear to be
the saviour of the company,
and nobody, even if
suspicious, would have
complained,' says Osborne.
And the plan would have
worked, had it not been for
the unforeseen collapse of
Atari and Texas Instruments
just around the time when
Jaunich was about to raise
£30 million in private capital
to finance Osborne's next few
months.
With the withdrawal of Tl
and the announcement of
Atari losses, the investment
community wouldn't touch
microcomputers, says
Osborne. And so the whole
plot was undone, and the
company went into
bankruptcy.
Evidence provided in the
book for this theory is thick,
but all circumstantial.
Osborne is at pains,
throughout the text, to show
that his examples of
'mismanagement' could be
interpreted as sensible
reactions to a genuine crisis.
It's just that he doesn't believe
there was a genuine crisis.
Osborne is entitled to his
opinion and just possibly
Jaunich might have been
tempted to dismiss it as 'sour
Once you've shelled out your life savings on a computer,
you'll find the list of people prepared to take another few
quid off you is now lengthened by somebody producing
'VDU spectacles'.
These apparently exclude ultra-violet and infra-red,
make a clearer image, and are available in a 'variety of
colours'.
My suggestion, if you have a harmful VDU, is: get a
better display. For full information on these trendy new
fashion accessories ('I have to wear them, because of my
powerful computer display') contact Bolle UK on (04254)
79055.
PCW 93
NEWSPRINT
grapes' — were it not for one
interesting factor, in the
character of a co-author of the
book.
The book was prepared
with the help of John Dvorak,
who was, at the time it was all
going on last year, editor of
the West Coast weekly,
Infoworld.
Dvorak's reputation as a
reporter is very high, and is
bound to make many readers
take the book more seriously
than they would otherwise.
He has no obvious axe to
grind, and the fact that he has
apparently taken Adam's
theories seriously must
inevitably lead others to think
longer before dismissing
them.
Nonetheless, there will be
many who will not believe a
word of it.
Mike Healy, the man who
ran Osborne UK and who now
acts as Osborne's UK
distributor (the company has
emerged successfully from
bankruptcy as a going
concern) was far too canny to
make any statement about his
own personal beliefs.
But, he did comment:
There are many obvious
reasons why Adam might
want that version of events to
be accepted, and why he
might believe it himself.'
And one of Osborne's
closest colleagues inside the
company confided: 'It's just
classic, the man cannot
accept that he could make a
mistake, and now admits that
he did, but only the mistake of
believing that he was
mistaken. He thinks that if he
had stayed on as president, all
might have been well.
'And, historically, that
wasn't an option open to him,
even back in November '82:
the weight of executive
opinion inside Osborne
Computer Corporation was
already building up behind an
"Adam Must Go" campaign,'
added the inside man.
Nonetheless, no one who
knows US stock market habits
and big business practices
will deny one thing.
That is: the sort of thing
which Adam writes about
has happened before, is
happening somewhere today,
and will happen next year. It
isn't just wild fantasy, even if
it didn't happen at Osborne
Computer Corporation.
The Pied Piper of
Atari takes his
revenge
Jack Tramiel, ex-boss of
Commodore, has taken over
quite a lot of Atari's computer
business.
No one uses the word 'fired'
about someone as important
as Tramiel — not because
they are in any doubt about it,
but because even if it is
blindingly obvious that he
wanted to run a micro
company, and wouldn't have
left Commodore unless under
pressure to do so, the word
'fired' is supposed to be rude.
I won't use it, either,
because although it is the
word most Commodore
insiders use, there is still the
possibility that this very
ingenious man has bought
Atari in order to bring it into
the Commodore empire.
Tramiel is, of course, wealthy.
He also has access to
powerful backers, and the
news that he was able to pay
$240 million for a complicated
package of shares and debt
shouldn't be a shock.
But it was — especially to
Philips, where talks were still
under way preparing for a
takeover on the day the
Tramiel deal was announced.
The future (in terms of
hardware) is still
unpredictable. In human
terms, however, it is
becoming clear that many of
Atari's top executives are
leaving, and that friends of
Tramiel are moving in.
Famous for the 'revolving
door management style' of
quick hire and fire. Tramiel
has never been one to respect
people who stood up to him
and told him he was wrong.
But when it comes to the
high technology designers,
his record is very different —
and many of the brightest
chip technologists and
systems designers from
Commodore and MOS
Technology are expected to
follow him to Atari.
His UK acolytes, however,
don't have this option. And
one of Tramiel's firmest
followers in Commodore UK
was always marketing boss
John Baxter.
Baxter has now left
Commodore, but not to go to
Tramiel Technology (TTL). He
has joined the Vulcan part of
Andromeda, where he has yet
to reveal his long-term plans.
Share and share
alike
Software to share IBM micros
among several users together
is starting to turn that
machine into a multi-user
system.
Multi-user micros continue
to make money for
companies like Altos and ICL,
if only because the big-selling
machines like IBM and Sirius
and Apple don't have any way
of letting a half-dozen people
share the same system.
The real trick is not just to
have people share the
system, but share the
workload — for example, with
two clerks both entering
orders into the same file. It's a
trick beyond some systems
which call themselves
'multi-user'.
The first newcomer. Alloy's
PC Plus, appeared in
I prototype form in July, with a
promise of full details in
August.
This system involves
plugging new processors into
the IBM box, and using the PC
Plus software to link them
together, sharing disks and
printers, with the extra users
talking to the processors from
remote terminals.
The fact that full details are
still not forthcoming is not
encouraging, especially when
you read claims like 'a single
IBM PC can be expanded into
a multi-user system
comprising up to 30
processors' and that 'the
family comprises single board
16-bit and 8-bit processors.'
Data transfer is 'orders of
magnitudes faster than local
area networks' adds Alloy.
This claim implies that it is at
least 100 times faster.
And there is no word on
how multi-access software
would run on a system with
both 16-bit and 8-bit
processors, which makes it a
good bet that it won't.
Digital Research, which has
been plugging away at the
concurrency idea for a couple
of years now, has started
talking about a very similar
sounding system to Alloy's —
DR StarLink.
StarLink uses
Concurrent-DOS as the basis
of its operating software.
It is already available to US
users, but won't be freely
available in the UK until
September— but the claims
already imply that
multi-access will be possible.
'Several people can gain
access to the same programs
or files at the same time,' is
the way the official
announcement put it — but
there is a not very subtle
difference between 'gaining
access to' and 'updating'.
Like Alloy's system StarLink
is based on add-on
processors, letting up to five
people use the same IBM PC
box (four of them on remote
terminals) together.
From a new American
name, Bluebird, a third
multi-user solution is called
SuperDos.
This is a very ambitious
multi-access system. It
genuinely does allow two
users to update the same file,
with precautions built-in to
make sure that they don't
actually update the same
record.
'SuperDos applies locks at
the logical record level, not
merely at the sector of file
level,' the company claims —
and that is both safer, and
quicker.
There is just one small
A camel for the Spectrum — nothing to do with Jeff
Minter's hump-mania , either. It's a family of devices to
load EPROM memory chips with your own program , run
the program , and change the program. The unusual
feature , according to Cambridge Micro Electronics
(CaME1) f is that you can use the Spectrum ROM program
memory at the same time.
Full catalogue details on (0223) 314814.
94PCW
No, we’re not exaggerating.
Thanks to the Psion Organiser (that's
the one on the right), you can now walk
around quite comfortably with a com¬
puter in your pocket. You can travel
on a bus without taking up two seats.
Or stroll through a revolving door
with confidence.
In fact, you'll be carrying an expand¬
able computer system with
a microprocessor that's
significantly more advanced
than those commonly found
in micros costing 20 times
as much.
Unlike some of its larger
counterparts, however, the
Organiser’s simple language
and command structures
make it very easy to operate.
Even for the computer novice.
An extremely efficient
filing s ystem in your pocket.
The Psion Organiser
comes complete with a plug¬
in datapak which can
permanently store over
10,000 characters. Allowing
you to enter such day-to-day
information as diary engage¬
ments, telephone numbers,
addresses, train times and
exchange rates. To name but
a few applications.
You can type in informa¬
tion and “SAVE" it in any
form you want and retrieve it
quickly and simply with the
“FIND” key.
So you'll no longer have to
juggle with diaries, notebooks
backs of old envelopes to keep
yourself organised.
All entries can be
simply amended by
using the Organisers editing facility.
And since all data is permanently
stored in the datapak, you’ll never lose
it, even if the batter}' is disconnected.
Carry out complex calculations -
sim pl y and swiftly .
Without plugging in any additional
software, the Organiser can carry out
calculations involving up to 200
characters and two levels of brackets.
Entries are typed in and displayed
the way you would write them.
Moreover, you can go back and edit
both data and formulae, even after the
calculation has been carried out.
So it s simple to correct entry mistakes
and perfonn “what if” calculations.
In addition, the time and date are
One way or another,
; k nd you can have a 7 e 0
computer in your pocket.
displayed at the touch of a button.
Expand your Or g aniser , but not
your pocket.
On receiving your Organiser you
will find that it has two unique ‘solid
TO: PSION LTD . 22 Dorset Square. London NW16QC.
Please send me by registered mail QUANTITY PRICE
Psion Organiser with 8K datapak
Science Program Pack
Maths Program Pack
Financial Program Pack
16K datapak
HK datapak
P+P
£.9995 +£.250
£.29 95 +£150
£29 95 +£1 50
£29.95 +£150
£1995 +£1 25
£1295 +£1 25 _
I enclose my chcque/Postal order made payable to Psion Ltd
or Please debit my credit card iplease tu k appropriate Box i
Access O Bare lave ardA'isa □ American Express O Diners Club O
state drives concealed under its pro¬
tective sliding case.
These matchbox-sized units are key
to the open-ended power of the
Organiser, allowing you to create and
use an infinitely large personal and
permanent information base on 8K
and 16K datapaks.
Two 16K datapaks together give a
total storage of over 40,000
instantly accessible characters.
Additionally, either size of
datapak can be used in con¬
junction with any program
pack to produce unbeatable
processing power in your
pocket.
Comprehensive software
pro grams.
Available immediately are
three plug-in 16K program
packs for financial, science
and maths applications, the
beginning of a software
library.
Sowhetheryoure involved
in management,engineering,
technolog}', sales or account¬
ancy, there's a program pack
containing all the software
you'll need for standard
computations and a lot more
besides.
Each program pack incorp¬
orates a database containing
essential specialist facts,
figures and formulae, plus
(more importantly) a simple-
to-understand programming
language. Enabling you to
write your own software programs
(upjo 16K long) and run them off a
datapak whenever
needed.
In short, the Psion
Organiser is as functional as systems
200 times its size.
It's a computer with screen, key¬
board, operating system and twin
solid drives for data and program
storage.
But, at £99.95, it’s a lot less strain on
your pocket.
PsionLtd.,22DorsetSquare,LondonNW 16QG.
Signature:-
Name (Mr/Mrs/Miss/Ms)_
Address:_
-PCW17-B .Postcode _
To place an order over the telephone, ring (01) 200 0200anytime
Psion Ltd Reg No 1520131 England Orders tan only be accepted lor deliver} within theUK
Please allow 14 days for deliver}’ nfTinn^n
II I.m not lompleieb '.iiistied wub\>nii ■■■!■■■■■■ ■■
I’m. mi 'i c-oiimi return it in c.>.>.l. .Muliti.m within m \, n,l.i\ I JLlI II | II J I
and we'll return your money in full and without question
NEWSPRINT
problem: SuperDos is not
compatible with any other
IBM standard operating
system. It may offer indexed
sequential access method,
with multi-keyed files— but
wonderful though that is, it
doesn't help much when you
wantstorun LotusorWordStar
orwhatever.
Bluebird is in Atlanta on
(404) 451 4470. Alloy is in the
UK on (0272) 290651.
Executive answer
is'think big*
Ashton-Tate products in the
dBasell family can now
download mainframe
database information in a
format that they understand,
with a product developed
jointly with Informatics, a
mainframe software
company.
The new product is called
dBase/Answer. The move
should give a lot more
executives access to
mainframe information.
It always sounds a lot
cleverer than it is, to offer 'full
IBM-compatible mainframe
communications' on a micro.
What it does is to let you
access the mainframe as if
you had a terminal, and get
information out of it as if you
were an authorised user. Fair
enough, except that the cost
of the terminal isn't usually
the problem — it's the cost of
having yet another user
(inexpert, occasional, and
likely to cause problems) on
the mainframe, and the cost
of keeping data there, that
makes the DP manager
postpone the decision.
dBase Answer deals with
the complex task of taking a
mainframe file, and turning it
into a dBase file. Once that's
been done, the micro user can
switch to dBasell or dBaselll,
or Friday! or the latest
product, Framework, and
create reports, print sorted
lists, orwhatever.
Double size,
double trouble!
Some of the excitement has
drained out of my discovery
of DoubleMode, the company
which sells computer colour
monitors made out of
ex-rental TVs, for £85.
I ordered one to test, and
was assured that it would be
with me quickly. 'But we don't
have the 14-inch screens —
the smallest is a 20-inch. Is
It may look like a square floppy disk. It is in fact a 'hard'
floppy disk, holding 20 megabytes — the secret of making
a floppy disk hard is the speed you spin it. Apstor's Alpha
10 has now been sold to a Dutch buyer — first export order
— as a result of a Netherlands magazine review which
found it to be 'the first removable cartridge storage device
to pass every one of their tests'. And that is the key — it is
a cartridge , and cheap. Most hard disk systems are
permanent unremovable, and take hours to copy onto
floppies. This one can be copied onto another cartridge in
less than five minutes.
Details on (0273) 422512.
that OK?'the salesman asked.
I said it was.
The trouble is that your
mind doesn't translate 20
inches into reality. Think
about the sort of coffin which
comprises an out-of-date,
ex-rental colour TV set with a
20-inch screen, and you will
start to construct the scene
that ensued when the thing
was delivered.
First, I thought it must be all
packing. It wasn't. It was
huge, and it took two people
to carry it upstairs.
Next, when placed on the
table, it turned out to leave no
space for the microcomputer.
A platform under it, made
space for the micro, but then
it turned out to be simply too
big to sit that close to. You get
a stiff neck, swivelling your
head around to look from the
left to the right of each line.
Probably the ideal solution
would be a baronial table,
with the display at one end,
and the computer at the other.
Perhaps this would have been
tried, if the display hadn't
switched itself off after the
first day's use.
I rang Double Modetotell
the company that itsonsite
maintenance was about to be
tested — and the phone
wasn't working.
An official at the Irvine
Development Corporation
assured me sadly that the
phone was indeed out of
order, but that it hardly
mattered. The factory is on
holiday for two weeks,' said
the unhappy voice.
I may stand it on end and
use it as a coffee table ...
Software
consultancy
which aims to
'cleanup'
Sticking his neck a long way
out, ex-IBM salesman David
Everard is taking his software
house (RSB Systems) into the
hardware market.
He is doing it, he says, to
save users from people who
sell inappropriate hardware.
This is a touchy little subject
at the moment, following the
star treatment given to Keith
Park of ParWest (a software
consultancy) on the radio
Watchdog show.
Roger Cook interviewed
Park and also spoke to several
of his angry clients. They told
of systems (for which
advance payment was
requested) which never
worked, and didn't meet their
needs, and which were
delivered late anyway.
The incident has left scars
in the minds of many in the
business micro trade since
Park announced he was going
out of business (a press
release which, he told Cook
on the radio, should have said
'temporarily, for a month' but
didn't).
Everard of RSB is not
specifically referring to the
sort of problem that faces
ParWest's unhappy clients —
he is concentrating more on
the phenomenon of being
called in by businesses which
have actually gone to a shop,
and bought a micro which he,
Everard, then has to tell them
is just not suited for the job of
running the application they
need.
'We were originally set up
in 1979 as a software house,
specialising in accountancy
programs for IBM mini and
micro systems,' Everard told
me, 'and in all too many
cases, people buy the
hardware before thinking of
the software.'
His new Business Systems
Centre has agreed to deal in
IBM, Apple and NCR micros,
but, he insists 'the work will
be more along the lines of
consultancy than pure
hardware sales.'
If the plan works, he could
find himself putting out fires
caused by software being
bought from unqualified
consultancies, too.
Details on (02357) 66330.
Lisp
implemented on
MS-DOS
A new product for those
following Dick Pountain's
Teach Yourself Lisp series:
Microsoft has released a
version of the language for
MS-DOS computers.
The package, called the
muLisp-82 Artificial
Intelligence Development
System (sounds like a set of
mental exercises), will work
mainly on IBM family
machines, where it requires a
minimum of a single floppy
It can cope, says Microsoft,
with the bigger (segmented)
memory systems of the 8088
or 8086 family of microchips
— something arbit beneath
one or two Lisp compilers
which can restrict memory
artificially.
As well as two educational
games, the package also
includes an implementation
of the original Eliza or Doctor
program, written by Joseph
Weizenbaum of the
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology — the program
which always ducked any
attempt to ask it a question,
by turning the question into
another. ('Who are YOU?' —
'Why do you want to know?')
If you can'tfind a store
96PCW
T P ] ■ y r hi A Superb Dot ^
I C* 1 1 L * L J Matrix Business '
Printer At An Exceptional Price!
Prints 140
cps 10, 12,
16.7 CPI
e 499
Reg. Price £699.00
Inc.
VAT
SAVE
£ 200
■ 132-Column Capacity At 10 CPI ■ Prints 140 CPS
■ Cover Design Reduces Printing Noise
DMP-420. This superb, quiet, cost-effective dot matrix printer
features correspondence, data processing and bit-image graphics
modes for many office applications. Prints 10, 12 or 16.7
characters per inch; 51 lines per minute at 10 cpi, mode and pitch
are switch or software selectable and it prints original, plus two
copies. Adjustable tractor uses 4” to 15" fanfold paper with
friction platen for single-sheets. It also has selectable parallel and
Colour Computer-compatible serial interfaces (600/1200 baud).
Printer dimensions 6 3 /s x 24 Vs x 13 3 /s M .
26-1267 £499.00
Printer Cable. Can be used with Model I/III/4/4P. Quality
engineered to perform to the highest standards and add
maximum flexibility and convenience. 34-pin edge card to 36-pin
plug. 6 feet long.
26-1401 . £19.95
Printer Cable. Can be used with Model II/12/16/16B/2000. 34-
pin header to 36-pin plug. 6 feet long.
26-4401 . £24.95
Printer Cable. Can be used with Model II/12/16/16B/2000. 34-
pin header to 36-pin plug. 12 feet long.
26-1323 £19.95
Offer Ends 29th Sept. 1984
Some Useful TRS-80
Accessories!
r/
PTC-64 Printer Controller
Now you can print one job
while working on another! Our
new PTC-64 “print buffer”
accepts and stores information
from your computer at top
speed and feeds it to your
printer as fast as the printer can
handle it. Standard parallel
printer interfaces.
26-1269 £229.00
RS-232C Selector Switch
Connect any three RS-232C
devices to your TRS-80
computer. There are two
switched ports for modems,
digitizers, plotters and one
configurable port for
communication between two
computers. Cables not
included .26-1499 £129.95
Parallel Printer Switch
Connect two printers to one
computer, or two computers to
one printer. Dual parallel ports
permit quick and easy
switching. For any TRS-80 or
data terminal with a standard
parallel interface. Cables not
included 26-1498 £99.95
Take A Look At
Tandy Today
Visit your local store or dealer and
ask about our expanding range of
microcomputers and software -
we service what we sell!
See Yellow Pages For Address Of
Store Nearest You
r
Send For Further Information to:
■'i
Computer Marketing, Tandy Corporation (Branch UK), Tameway Tower,
Bridge Street, Walsall, West Midlands. WS1 1LA
Name .
Address
^ Post Code.Tel. No. PCWsJ
r
•SANYO
By next year,
EVEN IBM MIGHT HAVE ONE
This is the Sanyo MBC 555.
The first high performance business
machine of its kind to offer the compati¬
bility and versatility of a true 16-Bit business
micro for less than £1,000+ VAT*
A revolutionary price for a revolution¬
ary machine because with 128K RAM ex¬
pandable to 256K RAM, both the twin drive
MBC 555 and the single drive MBC 550 have
an 8 colour graphics capability (640 x 200
dot resolution), an 8088 CPU for high-speed
processing, a Centronics parallel printer
interface and free bundled software.
Add to this the support of a compatible
•EXCLUDING MONITOR
range of peripheral equipment, a compre¬
hensive selection of soft ware and a price tag
of less than £1,000 + VAT (MBC 550 £749 +
VAT) and you’ll probably understand why
this package is so attractive.
But the real beauty of the MBC 555/550
series is that you don’t have to wait until
next year for them.
If you want to see these two innova¬
tive machines from Sanyo’s proven range of
Micros phone LOG1TEK on 0257 426644 or
STC on 0279 26777 or ICARUS on 01-485
5574 or clip the coupon and we’ll show you
how to stay one step ahead
r
Name
H
Company
Position in Company
Address
Tel. i
_RCWI9I84
L Return to: Marketing Dept., Sanyo Marubeni (UK) Limited,
Sanyo House, 8 Creycaine Road, Watford, Herts.
f See SanyqThen Decide
NEWSPRINT
selling it, contact Microsoft
UK on (07535)59951.
Broadly
speaking...
One of the very first computer
shops to be set up in Britain
was Comart, which expanded
two years later by buying the
Byte Shop chain.
The man who started it all
off was David Broad, who has
now made himself personally
wealthier by selling out to
Kode.
What the move will mean to
people who buy micros from
Comart or its subsidiary
companies is just guesswork.
But what it will mean to
people who read this column,
I'm afraid, is that David Broad
is likely to be quoted more
often.
Broad is out to become a
force behind the scenes in
government circles.
He has done his bit in the
past, setting up things like the
British Microcomputer
Manufacturing Group, and
lobbying for changes in
import duties, and so on.
'I don't expect to be going
in for politics, at least, not for
a few years,' Broad told me
when the news broke, 'but
that does remain a possibility.
What I'm really out to do,
though, is to get involved in a
few more government
committees, and advise a few
more City people on the micro
business.'
Just because he's a
comfortably off ex-chairman
of an enterprising start-up
company with contacts in
Parliament, doesn't mean you
can expect him to wear a blue
tie.
'I am not a Tory,' he said
candidly, 'nor yet Labour. I
tend towards the centre in
British politics.' And he
confessed to being a member
of 'one of the Alliance parties'.
Good news, perhaps, for
whichever Alliance party that
is.
The Kode deal valued
Broad's 82 per cent of Comart
at £2,500,000. Quite a
substantial part of that money
was paid in cash (less than
half, though).
In return, Broad will be
're-investing some of the
money to secure a 5 per cent
holding in the enlarged
group'.
Somewhere over
the rainbow
The price cut of a DEC
Rainbow by 20 per cent to
£2295 doesn't sound as good
as it is.
Two important points by
comparison with the IBM
micro need to be made: first,
this price does include two
400k disk drives, and second,
it includes the Z80 processor
with ordinary CP/M as well as
the MS-DOS machine, in the
same box.
DEC also makes much of a
unique free maintenance
scheme, backed up by a
personal hotline service,
which is not something you'll
get from other suppliers, and
is worth a mention in passing.
Chip talk
Just a small aside to Sir Clive
and his QL: Motorola, the
company which makes the
68008 chip inside the QL, has
announced a 32-bit version.
In the announcement.
Motorola refers to the 68000
(the existing chip of which the
68008 is the little sister) as 'a
sixteen-bit processor'.
If Motorola thinks that the
68000 is a 16-bit chip, why
does Sinclair think that the
eight-bit version of it is a
32-bit processor? His own
explanation (at the time of the
launch, you may remember)
was 'We decided to skip the
16-bit chips because we
wanted to wait for the 32-bit
chips, which have more
memory'.
The 68008 can address a
megabyte of memory. That is
more or less exactly what the
IBM's 8088 chip can address.
Don't rush off, by the way,
looking to buy the new 32-bit
Motorola chip, because even
when samples are available a
few months from now, the
chip will probably fetch
£400 ... and until then, can
we please save the term
'32-bit' for when we really
need it?
A wise move?
It is very impressive to see
software appearing, at last,
for the QL. But it is a little
alarming, to say the least, to
see how many people are
preparing to run businesses
with the beast.
Sagesoft, of Newcastle
upon Tyne, has agreed to put
the Sage accounts program
on the QL.
I'm very happy to pass on
this announcement, but after
years of disasters with floppy
disks, I really don't feel up to
recommending that you
actually try running accounts
on a QL until you've used the
machine for six months, and
have a very good idea of how
long a microdrive cartridge
lasts.
On the other hand, there
isn't any cause for panic.
Sagesoft endearingly predicts
thattheQLversion'willbe
launched in Spring 1984,'by
which the company means in
nine months' time.
Other software, according
to Sinclair boss Nigel Searle,
is just around the corner.
Responding to recent
scepticism about 'where is the
software', Searle retorted
with the rhetorical question:
'Tell me one software house
which isn't preparing a
package for the QL.'
It's not the sort of question I
can answer, but it did sound
convincing.
Sagesoft is on (091) 284
7077.
Before you
upgrade to
dBaselll...
The main difference between
the old dBasell database,
which sold so well, and the
new dBaselll, which Ashton
Tate has just launched, is that
the new one assumes you are
using a 16-bit processor — or
larger.
The main difference
between eight-bit systems
(generally) and sixteen-bit
systems, is the amount of
memory available, and the
size of the file descriptors.
So dBaselll can store up to
two billion records per file,
and 128 fields per database.
From the database user's
point of view, the biggest
change will be the ability to
use 10 database files
simultaneously — where
dBasell could only manage
two.
And it also uses colour.
The only doubts about the
new product concern its
newness. According to one
consultant, the new version is
nowhere near as stable as
dBasell (which is no surprise,
of course) — but also, not as
stable as it might be at launch.
That's the sort of
information which isn't very
useful except as a vague
warning, since the only way
to test a database for stability
is to use it heavily for six
months. Typically, databases
seldom break down when
trying to manipulate one or
two small files, even if they
are known to be flaky.
On the other hand, it's
worth passing on somebody's
doubts, just in case you were
It may sound a lot for a single circuit card, £500, but what
makes it sound better is the list of things the Ultrapak
does for an IBM PC.
Its main task is to give graphics to a monochrome IBM
system, including Lotus 1-2-3- graphics.
It also provides other essential add-ons, such as a
Centronics compatible parallel port, a serial RS232port,
and a clock/calendar with its own battery, so that the
computer always knows what time and day it is when you
turn on.
Finally, it lets you pretend you have a VT100 terminal so
that you can connect your IBM to Digital Equipment minis.
Details from MBS Plus on Colnbrook 3292.
PCW99
APRICOT OPEN DAYS AT MORSE
MORSE COMPUTERS INVITE YOU TO TRY
THE NEW APRICOT FI AND PORTABLE
SEPTEMBER 26th/27th, 10AM TO 8PM
\ A/EDNESDAY the 26th &Thursday Also on the Portable: a flat-panel dis-
VV27th of September are two play of sensible size. Neat 3 Vtl disk
dates to note in your diary. Morse will storage. And both the FI and the
be presenting the complete range, Portable have a slim, cordless
featuring the new Apricot Portable keyboard, colour graphics and
and the FI, as well as the desktop optional mouse. Technical staff from
Apricot and the hard-disk Apricot Xi. ACT will be on hand to discuss their
Coffee and cocktail snacks will be features and run the latest software
served, and you will be encouraged packages for you.
to use the new machines in the com- You’ll be able to talk through your
fortable atmosphere of our own applications with the friendly
demonstration suite. Talk to the Morse staff. And get details of our
speech-recognising Apricot Portable! "Open Days” special offers.
IBM PC PACKAGES
IBM PACK 1. Our IBM Starter Kit.
IBM PC, two 360K disk drives,
DOS 2.0, monochrome display,
printer adaptor, 128K RAM,
£2141 and we include the NEC
8023 graphics printer and cable.
normally £329. at no charge.
IBM PACK 2. Colour & Graphics.
IBM PC, two 360K disk drives,
DOS 2.0, colour/graphics monitor,
256K RAM: £2749. At no extra
cost: NEC 8023 printer, PFS Write
w/d. Eliza artificial intelligence
program. Saving £447 on list.
IBM PACKS 3 & 4. PC XT,
software. Daisy printer at no cost.
MORSE COMPUTERS
IBM PORTABLE PC
JUST ARRIVED! New from the USA
Is the Portable PC. Two slimline
disk drives, 9" amber graphic dis¬
play, lightweight keyboard that
hinges on the main unit, the ability
to run all of your PC software, and
portability so you can run with it.
Adding a new dimension to com¬
puting, the Portable gives you
everything you want from your PC,
in a 301b takeaway package. Col¬
our adaptor, 256K RAM and 5
expansion slots provide versatility
with that all-important IBM badge
on it. Drop by for a demo. Pick up
a leaflet, then the computer.
MORSE HARDWARE
TELEVIDEO TS1605, 803, TPC1,
Digital Rainbow 100, Epson PX8
and QX10, Sanyo MBC 555,
Kaypro 4 and 10, Hyperion and
NEC PC8201. All these in stock,
best prices and most with bundled
software. We have a wide range of
printers. Choose Qume, Digital,
Brother, Dataproducts or Epson,
including the new LQ1500.
SOFTWARE. Morse have all the
best and latest software packages.
Symphony, Framework Open
Access and dBASE III. Contact us
with your needs, and we’ll advise
you on solving your problems.
SURPLUS
From our ex-display stock
Hewlett Packard HP83 (£1595) 295.00
HP87, list £1595 . 495.00
Epson MX 100, list 499 . 290.00
Anderson-Jacobson acoustic
coupler modem, list £265 .... 100.00
Apple III . 750.00
Apple II disk drives from. 175.00
Apple II VisiCalc. 60.00
Apple II VisiTrend/Plot. 75.00
Apple II Multiplan . 60.00
Apple II Language Cards. 40.00
Apple colour/80col cards from 65.00
Systematics Accounting, each 35.00
Sharp MZ80A list £477 . 190.00
Sharp Accounts software from 3.00
You've gottoTake
Your Hat off to
these, morse People
THeS HAVE All THE
I ZloHT TECHNOLOGY*
MORSE
78 HIGH HOLBORN, LONDON WC1V 6LS. 01-831 0644. TELEX 916509.
100 PCW
NEWSPRINT
Mouse, pen, digitising tablet and graphics — when I saw
this in America, it was a Pencept tablet Here in Britain, it
turns out to be called the Kode Penpad 320.
Just as a mouse for the IBM , it would be worth
considering. But the ability to write on the pad', and see
the words appear on the screen, makes it worth serious
consideration, especially for non-typists. And it will, says
Kode, work with Lotus 1-2-3.
Details on (0249) 813771.
planning to use it for
something critical — so that
you can take the precaution of
keeping your old system
going at the same time, until
the new one is proved stable.
And I suppose you could
describe the company,
Ashton Tate, as having
proved that it will stay around
and support the product.
Acorn first past
the post
The BBC's decision to stick
with Acorn and the BBC Micro
put an end to months of
rumour— but not to
discussion on the subject.
Acorn won a new four year
contract to manufacture and
distribute the BBC Micro.
Competition from Sinclair
Research's QL and late starter
ACT with its Apricot FI made
no impression on BBC
Enterprises.
Tenders from at least four
other micro manufacturers,
including one which has now
called in the receiver and
another which doesn't
actually have a machine yet
fared no better. Sir Clive just
hasn't had any luck — the
NewBrain, originally intended
to be the first BBC Micro, also
started out life on the Sinclair
drawing board.
There's no mention in the
new contract of a new BBC
machine: it speaks of Acorn's
commitment to 'support and
enhance' the BBC B for the
term of the agreement.
However, a spokesman for
Acorn admitted that the BBC
B would not be competitive
throughout the four years of
the contract, and stated that a
new BBC Micro would be
coming from Acorn.
Comment from Sinclair was
spartan but Commodore was
more outspoken, while
denying it wanted the
contract. John Baxter,
Commodore's marketing
manager for the present, but
due to leave soon, was not
impressed. 'I'm surprised BBC
renewed for the same damn
product. Sales are already
declining, and internal
pressure is building in the
BBC to unhitch from
commercial involvement with
any company. Nowhere does
anyone from the BBC say
anything about a new micro
— that's the most significant
part of the announcement.'
If Acorn does have a new
BBC machine it won't appear
before the launch of its range
of business micros in
September. There are likely to
be two machines, both 16-bit,
one a portable. Informed
sources quote 3V2in drives
and built-in compatibility with
current BBC B business
software. One question which
has yet to be resolved is
whether you'll be allowed
(because you'll undoubtedly
be able) to pipe your software
from 5V4in to 3V2in disks. No
prizes for guessing which way
Acorn will go.
Jerry Sanders
BBC recording
deal for bit-part
‘stars'
Three new computer series
from the BBC are being
recorded. October this year
sees the start of a monthly
magazine on BBC 2 for
experienced enthusiasts.
provisionally called Micro
Magazine , and starting in
March 1985 two new series
will be broadcast on BBC 1.
The Learning Machine will
concentrate on educational
software and how to write,
choose and use it. A second
series, as yet untitled, will
explore the use of computers
by the handicapped.
Jerry Sanders
Expert from
Monaco
Monaco is the unlikely source
of a new expert system for the
IBM PC.
The company concerned is
Framenlec and the program
it's offering is a cut-down
version of its Lisp machine
S.1 expert system.
Known as M.1,the package
runs on the IBM PC under PC
DOS 2.0 with a minimum
memory requirement of 128k
RAM. Written originally in
G-Lisp, M.1 comes
pre-compiled and offers
automatic question
generation, fuzzy logic factors
and presupposition checking
— features normally
associated with systems
running on dedicated Lisp
machines.
No UK price has been set,
but don't expect it to be
cheap. The Xerox 1100
mainframe version of S.1 is
on 'introductory offer' at
$50,000 for the first CPU!
Jerry Sanders
'But the IBM keyboard already has a numeric keypad,' you
cry. 'Why would anybody want to spend around £150 on
an add-on?'
The answer, according to Touchstone Technology Inc, is
that: 'We know from discussions with PC owners that no
one uses the numeric keypad on the standard pc
keyboard.' That's because the keypad is actually a cursor
controller, and you have to press the Num Lock key to get
the numbers.
Details of the 29-key pad on (716) 235 8358 in Rochester,
New York.
Job spot
If you've ever wanted to work for PCWas well as read it,
now's your chance. We're looking for a staff writer to
coordinate our program pages. Once that's under control,
there'll be plenty of opportunity to contribute to the other
sections of the magazine.
We're also looking for somebody to take over Computer
Answers on a freelance basis. So if you've got the ability
to answer technical queries on a range of micros, write
and let us know. We're waiting to hear from you.
PCW 101
YANKEE DOODLES
Random bits
Xerox has introduced a
hardware/software package
thatallowsIBM PCstotieinto
Xerox's Ethernet local area
office systems network. It is
hoped that PC users will be
attractedto other
high-technology Xerox office
productssuch ascopiers,
storage devices and work
stations . . .Colecohas
introduced a disk drive forthe
Adam computer at a priceof
about $250, bringing thetotal
systemcosttoover$1000 . . .
Six different Japanese MSX
computersappearedatthe
Summer Consumer
Electronics Show (CES).
Manufacturers were nottaking
orders but admitted to 'testing
thewater' . . .Alsoatthe
SummerCES,Quicksilvaand
Virgin Games sponsored an
English breakfastfordealers
andthe press.The hotelchef
had nevermadekidneys,so
Quicksilva provided a recipe.
Unfortunately,the recipe
didn't say how they should be
served, so guests were
confronted with a largebowlof
wholekidneys. Itjustwasn't
Quicksilva'sday: itsrented
double-decker London bus
hadengine
problems so was unableto
providetransportation (or
publicity) . . .NorwereCES'
problemslimitedto
Quicksilva. The CES Daily
News reported thatthe Sinclair
QL computer uses an 8-bitZ80
microprocessor rather than a
32-bit68008MPU . . .Forthe
firsttimeever, moreeducation
and personal productivity
software packages were
introduced at CES than
games . . .Cancomputers
relieve the stress they cause?
Three manufacturers have
demonstrated devicesfor
measuring physical tension
through surfaceelectrodes
and provide userswith a wayto
monitortension, relievestress
and even play games. Watch
for announcements from Atari,
SynapseandThought
Technology . . .Researchersat
DavidAhlreports from overthe wateronaphone thatkeeps
yourdicuy^jim^ ojcecommandjjnodL^^
computers with ears.
theSubmicron Research
Facility atCornell University
haveproducedthefirstlayered
circuits,possiblythe
predecessors of truly 3D
integratedcircuits . . .The
3000-year-old cryptic wisdom
ofthelChing hasnowbeen
turned intoa$69.95computer
program by Prof Kerson Huang
oftheMassachusettsInstitute
ofTechnology. Headmitsto
selling'only afewcopies'.
Lookingfora
reason...?
Some years ago, popular lore
had itthatmoreApple
computers weresold because
ofVisiCalcthan for any other
reason. Sincethen,few
peripherals or software
packages have played such a
key role in the industry.
However, Computerphone
may be that unique product
which providesa reasontobuy
aMacintosh.
In appearance, it looks likea
sleekly-styled telephone
handset with a built-in
touchstone pad that hangs on
the left side of thecomputer.
The software disk stores 200
phone numbers, billing
information, memo pad and
calendar. You usethemouseto
select a name and the number
is dialled automatically.
The phone then becomes a
standard voice instrument: as
you are talking, thecomputer
can record any notesyou wish
to make about the call. When
you hang up, it makes a record
ofitsdurationandcost.
The calendar portion of the
program remindsyouof
meetings, appointments and
callsto bemade,andkeepsa
permanent record which can
be viewed or printed.
For $200, Computerphone is
one of the most interesting
products to come along in
manyayear. It'smadeby
Intermatrix, 5547 Satsuma
Ave, N Hollywood, CA91601.
Apple-
compatible
evolution
Foryears, MicroSci hasbeen
producing add-on diskdrives
for Apple and Commodore 64
computers. In an effortto
diversify abouttwo years ago
(atthepeakofthegamecraze),
the company considered
making a low-cost system
solely to play Apple games
(MPU, memory, diskdrive,
joystickand video port). Butas
thebottomdroppedoutofthe
games market, the design
grewand evolved intoafull
Apple-compatible computer.
The shoebox-size system
unit contains the MPU, 64k,
motherboard, I/O interfaces
and single disk drive. Built-in
are both serial and parallel
printer ports, RS232 portand
connectorsforaseconddisk
drive, monitor and joystick.
The Havac is exceptionally
easy to startup; onekeypress
causes itto automatically boot
up nearly any type of Apple II
disk (the only combination that
doesn'tworkisProdosplus
Basicwhich needsmorethan
64k). Ithasfullcolourgraphics,
upperand lowercase, butcan
display only 40 columnsof
text.
Ashort cable connectsa
detachable keyboard to the
system unit.The keys havea
goodfeel; layoutissimilarto
the Apple lie. Like the lie,the
Havac has no expansion slots
and I/O is buiIt i n. At just $850, it
should be a winner for schools
and home users who wanta
simplebutpowerful machine
with a huge software base.
The Havac is made by
MicroSci,2158S Hathaway St,
Santa Ana, CA 92705. And
pleasedon'tspell ithavoc.
Hearing aids
The IBM PC and Apple micros
are to grow electronic earsto
match the Apricot portable's.
Thenewelectronichearing
device has been demonstrated
by Dragon SystemsofWest
Newton, Massachusetts (no
relationto Dragon, UK).The
Dragon ear is considerably
more accurate than more
expensivedesigns:for
example, in a test of morethan
50,000 wordsthe Dragon
system madeonly34errors.
Dragon is supplying the
system on an OEM basisto
Koala Technologies (maker of
the Koala graphics pad)for
incorporation into three new
products. Inaddition, it will be
sold by other companies as an
add-on to the IBM PCand
Applecomputers. Priceofthe
earisaround$300.
This is the same system that
is used in the new ACT Apricot
Portable. The unit has an active
dictionary of 32 words which
canbechangedinaprogramto
othersetsof32words But
don'ttalktoitifyou haveacold
— itprobablywon't
understandyou.
Chirpee
conversations
Chirpee is a voice command
module that allows you to give
spoken commands to an Apple
orCommodorecomputer. It's
capableof accepting
commandsspokeninany
languagefrom English to
Swahili as it's based on
phoneticsyllables.
Moreover, Chirpee can be
trainedto respondtoone
person exclusively or to
several people. It can beeasily
integrated with practically any
software package and can
augment or take the place of
mouse, touch screen or
keyboard entry.
Thiscompact marvel costs
just$179. It'smadeby ENG
Manufacturing, 4304 W Saturn
Way, Chandler, AZ 85224.
A long way from
dinosaurs
The integrated software
system forthe Epson QX-10,
Valdocs (Valuable
Documents), has been praised
for its user-friendliness but
criticised for its slow response.
ChrisRutkowski, president of
Rising Star Industries,
developerof Valdocs, gave me
a previewofVersion 2 which
makesthecurrentversion look
likeadinosaur.
Integrated inthesystem are
word processing, database
management,calculation and
graphicsfunctions which are
so natural that a printed
manual is virtually unnecessary.
Although the QX-10 uses an
8-bitZ80A microprocessor,
Valdocs automatically takes
advantage of any amount of
installed memory withoutthe
user having to worry about
bank selection or memory
management. Filenamescan
be40 or more characters long
and are retrieved by keywords
ormenuselection.
Lookforan introduction in
late fall at regular Epson
dealers.
102 pc w
REGULAR,CONDENSED, OR
EXTENDED FACES.
CUT SHEET A4 OR ROLLER
PAPER.
BATTERY OR MAINS
OPERATED.
NOW ONLY
l£159.95
inc.VAT.
A maxim which eloquently describes the Brother
HR-5.
Less than a foot across, it’s nonetheless loaded with
features.
The little printer that’s low on decibels.
There’s one thing the HR-5 won’t give you.
Earache.
For the annoying ‘clickety clack’ many printers
produce is mercifully absent from the HR-5.
Quietly efficient, it delivers high definition
dot matrix text over 80 columns at 30 characters per
second (maximum).
Text or gra phics with ease.
The HR-5 also has something of an artistic bent
Being capable of producing uni-directional
graphics and chart images together with bi-directional
text What’s more it will hone down characters into
a condensed face, or extend them for added emphasis.
At home with home computers.
Incorporating either a Centronics parallel or
RS-232C interface, the HR-5 is compatible with BBC,
Spectrum, Oric, Dragon, Atari and most other home
computers and popular software.
Perfecdy portable, the battery or mains operated
HR-5 weighs less than 4 lbs, and has a starting price
of only £159.95 (inc VAT).
Which is really something to shout about
PLEASE SEND ME MORE DETAILS OF THE REMARKABLE BROTHER
HR 5 PRINTER.
NAME_
| ADDRESS__
TEI NO_ EGM2X84
AVAILABLE FROM: BOOTS, RYMANS, WILDINGS, SELFRIDGES AND ALL
GOOD COMPUTER EQUIPMENT STOCKISTS.
brotherW i
DEPT R BROTHER OFFICE EQUIPMENT DIVISION, JONES + BROTHER, SHEPLEY STREET, GUIDE BRIDGE, AUDENSHAW, MANCHESTER M34 5JD
TEL:06I 330 6S31 (10 LINES) 061 330 0111 (6 LINES) 061 330 3036(4 LINES),TELEX: 669092. BROTHER INDUSTRIES LTD., NAGOYA, JAPAN.
The reason our
new computer
comes with its own
monitor is
perfectly clear.
£239
Computer complete with
green screen VI)U (GT64)
£349
Computer complete with
colour monitor (CTM640)
CPC 464
complete
with
monitor
datacorder
CPC464 green screen VDU (GT64)
The newCPC464 comes complete
withitsowncolour monitor or green
screen VDU for obvious reasons.
Connect as directly as possible to the
electronics that control the screen
display and you get the best possible
performance.
The monitor drives each colour on the
screen directly from the computer. So
there ’ s no unwanted circuitry in the way
to distort the picture.
It’s clear and steady. Much better
than a micro/colour TV combination.
And there are no tuning problems,
either.
Complete, ready-to-go system.
The CPC464is unique at the price. No
other computer system offers youso
much for so little.
64Kof RAM (over42K available to
BASIC), 32K of ROM, colour monitor
or VDU, built-in cassette data recorder,
typewriter style keyboard, numeric
keypad and a very fast extended
BASIC.
Green screen VDU.
This purpose designed visual display
system has an 80 column text display.
Text and numerical data are bright,
sharp and easily read at a glance.
(Invaluable for word processing, ac¬
counting, budgeting and developing
programs).
Green screen versions of the CPC464
can beusedwithacolourTVby connect¬
ing the optional power supply and
modulator MP-1.
Amsoft. Wide range of software.
A rapidly expanding range of pro¬
grams is already available. The high
quality software takes full advantage of
the CPC464’shigh specification and
s peedloadin g capability. Which means
even complex programs can be loaded
quickly.
Arcade games, educational programs
and business applications are all
designed to utilise the CPC464’s
impressive graphics, sound and pro¬
cessing abilities.
Amstrad. User Club.
Whether you’re interested in serious
commercial applications or you’re
a games fanatic, you’ll want to join
the Club.
Members enjoy immediate benefits
like the privilege card, Club binder,
regularmagazine,competitionsfor
valuable prizes and contact with other
Amstrad users.
CPC464.
Unlimited scope for expansion.
At Amstrad, we look to the future.
That’s why there’s abuilt-in parallel
printer interface.
A low cost optional disk drive system
includingCP/M * and LOGO. A joystick
port. And the virtually unlimited poten¬
tial of the Z80 data bus with sideways
ROM support.
Optional 80 column dot matrix printer DMP-1.
Offers high performance computerised text processing
for only £199.95.
BOOTS COMET Dixons
Menzies RUMBELOWS
I"""* Trade mark Digital Research
AND OTHER
COMPUTER
STORES
AMSTRADI
ONI MAT IMA AFTER ANOTHER
I’d like to know more about the exciting CPC464 complete computer system.
Please send literature right away.
NAME
Ipr^nrjB
ADDRESS
,4 a til
POSTCODE
To: Amstrad Consumer Electronics pic, Brentwood House, 169 King’s Road,
Brentwood, Essex CM 14 4EF. Tel: Brentwood (0277) 228888.
_I
ACT Pulsar'File Transfer
It’s easy to get the impression that the differences between micros are there to tie
you down. How do you upgrade from 8-bit Apple to todays 16-bit micros, or copy files
between different 16-bit machines, without hours or even days of laborious data re-entry
- and all the dangers that entails?
The answer is Pulsar File Transfer. It puts Apple, Sirius, Apricot and IBM straight onto
the same wavelength, transferring file type, text, binary or graphic information
directly at up to 9,600 bits per second.
With the correct combination of Pulsar File Transfer packages you have access to
complete software freedom between IBM-PC, Sirius and Apricot and instant transfer
of data from Apple. Multiple files can be sent or received with a single command,
while an in-built error-checking facility guarantees absolute accuracy.
For more information on the Pulsar connection just return the coupon.
Vive la difference!
^ ACT (Pulsar) Ltd.
FREEPOST, Birmingham B161BR or call 021-455 7000.
POSITION
COMPANY
ADDRESS
PC.WI 9184
TEL:
Please send me further details
on the Pulsar File Transfer:
NAME
ORIENT EXPRESS
Inexpensive and
reliable storage
Storage standards are
becoming even more
confused.The latest Japanese
offering, the Quick Disk,
follows the principle of
Sinclair's microdrive (fast
sequential access) but isbased
on disk rather than tape—and
thedisksizeis2.8ins.
Quick Disk can store upto64k
or 128k per disk depending on
themodel. Itrotatesthediskby
aspiral method—consisting
of only one track—at423rpm,
with a recording density of
441 Obpi. The data transfer rate
is 101 k.
QuickDisk'smajor
advantage is that it only takes
eight seconds to load and save
an entire 64k prog ram, while a
conventional cassette tape
takesmorethan lOminutes.
One machine already
featuring Quick Disk isthe
recently launched Sharp
MZ-1500 low-cost home
computer but some of the MSX
machines will also be using it.
The MZ-1500 uses a Z80ACPU
of 3.58 MHz, with 64k RAM as
standard, 24kgraphic RAM, 4k
VRAM and 12k monitor ROM.
The MZ-1500's Basic is
compatible with Sharp's
earlier home computer model,
theMZ-700. All MZ-700
softwarewill runonthe
MZ-1500asthe latteremploys
the ordinary cassette drive
interface on which tapes are
interchangeable.
Quick Disk is nowavailable
from several manufacturers
including Mitsubishi—OEM
supplier of UnivacPC.Thevery
firstQuickDisktocomeonto
the market was from Mitsumi
Electronics,Tokyo. (Sharp
MZ-1500 uses the Mitsumi
drive.) The Mitsumi Quick Disk
isaboutthesamesizeasa
cigarette pack and costsEI .50
Suitable for low-cost home
computers, it is more reliable
than cassette tape. (PCW
readers will probablyseeone
of the MSX machines using the
Quick Drive by Christmas.)
SfT/n/'c/T/ro/Ca/azawafooasfsafoouf Japan's/nnovaf/Veanswerfo
Smclajr^sjrijcrqdrive, Epson's lap-held explosion and a VDUthe
sizeofa watch face. Watch this space!
Epson out front
with lap-helds
Epson has launched two more
lap-held machines only two
months after introducing the
PX-8.
The new computers, the
HC-40and HC-41, lookvery
similartotheNECandTandy
Kyocera portables. Thescreen
size is the same, too: 40
characters x 8lines.TheCPU
consists of the CMOS Z80chip,
3.6564MHz. 64kRAMand96k
ROM are standard and the LCD
screen is 240 x 64dots.
Standard interfaces include
RS232C, serial, barcode reader
and Centronics. A
microcassettedriveis
available as an optional
feature.
The micros have two major
attractions. Firstly,the
keyboards are detachable. The
HC-40 has a standard
typewriter keyboard,the
HC-41 hasan item keyboardon
whicheach keycanhave
user-defined functions to
facilitate easy key entry for a
specificapplication; andyou
can have a multiple key
assignmentfora numberof
different applications.
Secondly, another improve¬
ment on the model HX-20,is
that the new machines run
CP/M. With an optional disk
drive attached, a variety of
CP/M software isavailable.
Pricesofthe HC-40and
theHC-41 areapproximately
£400each.
Small is beautiful
Seikohaslauncheda
wrist-watch VDU—the
RC-IOOO.TheVDU can hold a
maximum 2k of data in its
RAM,and its LCDscreencan
display up to two lines of 12
characters at any onetime.
Here's howyou use it.
You wake up in the morning,
pick up your wrist-watch VDU
and connect it via the RS232C
attachmentto your desktop
microcomputer where you
keep your necessary
informationfortheday. Ittakes
only 10 seconds to transferthe
entire 2k of data, and then off
yougo!
An alarm soundsforeach
appointmentonthetime-table
(stored inthe VDU'smemory).
The RC-1000 is notthefirst
wrist-watch computer
launched by Seiko. In 1982the
company brought out a
wrist-watch TV; and in 1983 its
firstwrist-watch computer: the
UC2000. Although similar to
the RC-1000, it did not have an
automaticalarm.
Seiko's determination to
stick with wrist-watch
technology is remarkable. If
anyone is going to makethe
dream of the space age
science-fiction wrist unit come
true, I expect it'll be Seiko.
Retrogressive
step for Hitachi?
Eight-bit micros are notdead
(or at least not yet) inthe
Japanese market.
Hitachi, manufacturerof
large IBM-compatible
mainframes and OEM supplier
of these machines to NAS,
BASF, and Olivetti, has applied
mainframe design technology
to itsfirst-class 8-bit micro. It
has 1 Mbyte memory space,
and itsgraphicsdisplay
responsetimeis55times
fasterthan other Hitachi 8-bit
machines. For home users, a
'Superimpose'feature is
provided.
Hitachi believesthereisa
goodmarketforsucha
machine.Thetrend istomove
awayfrom 8-bit, butthereare
an awful lotofthecompany's
applicationsfor which you
reallydon'tneed 16-bit
technology.
The new models are the MB
S1/10at£350andtheMBS1/20
at£500; the latter being
directed atbusinesses.
Pick a graph, any
graph
Matsushita has just unveiled
its portable, electronic
(battery-operated)
plotter/typewriterwhich is
capable of printing graphs and
charactersin uptofour
different colours. The
'Panagraph'can print in black,
red, blue and green using
specially developed ball-point
pens at a printing stepof
0.1 mm. It has a small LCD
screen and 256kbufferstorage
sothatediting can becarried
outin memory beforethetext
and/or graphs are printed. It
has 3k RAM to store the textor
thegraphsand lookssimilarto
theBrother'sportable
typewriter,theEP-44.The
Panagraph weighs 2.6kg, and
costs£171 in Japan.
Almost simultaneously
Brothercameupwith itsown
very similar graphic machine
called 'Picograph'. This uses
four-coloured ball-point pens
and mostofthefunctionsare
designed for the convenience
ofdrawinggraphs. Picograph
runson batteries, weighs2.7kg
andcosts£168.
Music while you
work
Ricoh hasdevelopedasystem
whichcan record voiceand
musicaswellasdata,allonthe
samefloppydisk.ltcanbe
attachedtotheRicoh rangeof
microcomputersthrough a
special interface box.
Reproduction of voice and
music is program-controlled.
Thismeansyou can carry outa
Name that Tunetype of music
quiz on your computer.
Reproduction quality on the
floppy disk is as good as on an
ordinary musical cassette.
Through the
grapevine
Japanese MSX micros are not
going to be solely home
machines. The operating
system, developed by
Microsoft to the horror of some
other American companies,
will becompatiblewithCP/Mat
the system code level sothat
you can run any CP/M program
on any MSX machine. MSX
will also be compatible with
MS-DOS atthefile level to
enable interchange of data
betweenthetwosystems . . .
ASCII, a system
house/publishing company in
Tokyo, carried a special
Benchmarktest/evaluation
reportontheBBCBinits
influential monthly
microcomputer journal.
Acorn, we hear, is nowtalking
to several Japanesefirms
aboutthe possibility of a
marketing/collaboration
deal . . .IBM'srumourednew
lap-sizecomputer, itseems,
will probably not be madethis
time by Matsushita, because
IBM is unhappy about
Matsushita's secret sales of
IBM5550lookalikes.
Speculation is that the deal will
gotoHitachi. RTF!
PCW107
Ever wanted^ to know what_ a bibliographic database is?
Peter^ Tootill knows the answer; and a whole lot more
about bulletin boards.
You're bound to come across
theterm'bibliographic
database'at some stage, so
here'sabriefideaofwhatitis.
A bibliographic database is a
bit like an electronic library,
exceptthatwherea library
containsbooks,the
bibliographic database
contains information
relating to the books it
covers. It will have references
to, and abstractsfrom, books
and journals and other
publications and it is the ideal
location for researching
information on a particular
topic. One of the largest, if not
the largest, is Lockheed's
'Dialog'which holdsmore
than 40 million recordsof
information from 60,000
journals in overforty
languages!
Somebibliographic
databasesoperatein
specialised areas such as
EPO (European Patents
Office) which only carries
detailsofEuropean
published patent
applicationsand patents.
Others such as Dialog,
ESA-IRS, (the European
Space Agency Information
Retrieval Service), and
'Datastar'trytogiveaswidea
coverage as possible. The
providers of the services are
usually referred to as 'hosts';
eachhostprovidinga
numberof individual
databases. Dialog hasover
one hundred, ESA-IRS has
over30, Datastarhasaround
40.Costsofusingthe
systems vary. Most hosts
have a subscription fee, or at
least someform of
registration beforeyoucan
gainaccesstothesystem;
you are then charged on a
timebasisata ratethat
depends on the database to
beused.Somecostafew
dollarsan hour; othermore
specialised ones will setyou
back$2-300. However, most
searches only take afew
minutes,sototalcostswill
not necessarily be that great.
All the hosts are linked to
the packet-switching data
networksandinthiswaycan
beusedfrom many partsof
the country by means of a
localcallplusdatacharges.
Even overseas systemscan
be used at a cost belowthatof
an international phonecall.
Plug-in modem
Aplug-in modem boardfor
the Sirius (approved by
BABT) has been introduced
by ACT. Itcomescomplete
with software to use ACT's
own'Micromail'electronic
mail service, which is based
on Telecom Gold. The cost is
£295plusVAT. Moredetails
from ACTon (021 >4557000.
Bulletin board news
Hull, the birthplace of the
British BBS with Fred
Brown'spioneering Forum
80 system, has scored
anotherfirst. It'sthefirstUK
city outside London to have
fwobulletin boards.Called
'Hamnet'the second bulletin
board is designed for radio
hams.Tel: (0482)497150.
Hours: Mon-Thurs:
6pm-8am; weekends: 6pm
Frito8amMon.
Please note that Forum 80
has revised its system times
asfollows: weekdays:
5pm-11.30pm (Tues and
Thursregisteredusersonly);
weekends: noon-11.30pm.
Although CBBS Cumbria
on (06992) 314 has been
running for sometime, it has
inadvertently been
overlooked in 'Networks'.
Thesystem hasa lot of CP/M
usergroupsoftware
availablefor downloading.
Hardware includes a two
megabyte RAM disk
(speeding up responsetimes
noticeably).
Anotherinteresting point
is that it will accept callsfrom
normalV21 (300bps)andV23
(Prestel)andUS(Bell 103)
standard modems. When
you call it, it sends out a
message inviting you to
press'return'at the various
speeds. When it recognises
the correct codefor'return'it
knows it's gotyourstandard.
Thismeansyou may get a bit
ofgarbageasitsendsout
messages at speeds not
recognised by yoursystem.
CBBS Cumbria is a ring-back
system and runsfrom
6-10pmdaily.
Comms shopping
Davidson-Richards offers
a rangeof products basedon
thelBM,Appleand
Commodore micros, plus
someCP/M systems. It can
supply everything (including
themicro)fora rangeof
applicationsincluding micro
tomicroandmicrotolBMor
ICL mainframe links. More
detailsfrom:
Davidson-Richards, 29
Charnwood Street, Derby
DEI 2GU.Tel: (0332)683231.
BULLETIN BOARDS
UK free networks
CBBS South West .. .Tel:
(0626)890014. Hours: 24
hoursdaily.
Mailbox-80, W Midlands
Tel: (0384)635336*. Hours:
6pm-8am daily (ring-back
system).
Forum-80Hull .. .(Forum-80
HQ)Tel: (0482)859169.
International electronic mail,
libraryforup/down loading.
Hours: 3-11.30pm, Mon-Fri;
noon-11.30pm, Sat & Sun
(CCITT); midnight-8am,
daily (Bell 103).
Forum-80 Users Group, PET
Users section shopping list
system. Hours: Tues/Thurs
7-10pm; Sat/Sun 1-10pm;
nights, midnight-8am, US
(Bell 103)standards.
Forum-80 London . . .Tel:
(01 >9022546. Electronic
mail, library for down¬
loading. Hours: 7-10pm
weekdays; midday-IOpm
weekends. Ring and askfor
Forum-80.
MG-NetCBBS London . . .
Tel: (01)3992136. Facilities:
electronic mail, program
downloading. Hours: Sun
5-10pm.
Liverpool Mailbox. ..
Tel: (051)4288924.
Electronic mail, down¬
loading,TRS-80 information.
Hours: 24hoursdaily.
TBBS,London .. .Tel: (01)
3489400. Hours: daily
9am-7am.
BASUG...Tel: (0742)
667983. Hours: 24 hours
daily.
Computer Answers ... Tel:
(01)6313076. Hours: 24
hoursdaily.
CBBS Surrey... Tel: (04862)
25174. Hours: 24 hours daily.
Blandford Board ... Tel:
(0258) 54494. Hours: 24
hours daily.
Southern BBS. Tel: (0243)
511077. Messages, down¬
loading. Hours: 8pm-2am
daily (ring-backsystem).
NBBBS-North
Birmingham ... Tel: (0827)
288810
TBBS Southampton . . .Tel:
(0703)437200 (ring-back)
Stoke ITeC (Information
Technology Centre) (Remote
CP/M).. .Tel: (0782)265078.
Hours: 24hoursdaily.
UK commercial
systems which are
free in part
OISTEL. Tel: (01)6791888.
Run by Display Electronics
(newand surplus electronic
and computer equipment,
components, etc). The
system provides information
about stock lines, credit card
sales, and some message
facilities. 300 baud only at
present. Cost: free. 24 hours.
REWTEL. Tel: (0272) 236628.
Run by Radio and Electronics
World, the publishing side of
Ambitfelectronics
components suppliers).
Information on stock lines,
somemessagefacilities,
Businessusers: £15per
quarterand5p/minuteupto
credit card sales; the latter
only for subscribers. 300
baud only at present. Cost:
limited areas free, remainder
£10pa.24hours.
MAPTEL. Tel: (0702) 552941.
Run by Maplin (electronic
componentsand micro¬
computers). Provides
information on stocklevels,
credit card sales to existing
108 PCW
customers only. 300 baud
only. Cost: free. 24 hours.
ESTELLE. Tel: (0279)
443511 V21 (Datel 200);
(0279)441188 (Datel 600);
(0279) 441222 (Datel 1200).
For customers of STC
ElectronicServices. Office
hoursonly.
Subscriber
commercial
systems in the UK
PRESTEL. Subscribers only:
Prestel consists of a database
madeupof individual pages
provided by many different
organisations(not by Prestel
itself). 1200/75 baud service
at local call ratesfora large
percentage of potential
users. 300 baud service on
London telephone number
only, at present. Cost:
domesticsubscribers £5 per
quarter and no time charges
outside peak periods, 80 per
cent of pages are free.
6pm and Saturday
mornings, no time charges
outsidethese hours (time
chargesalsoapplyto
domesticusers).
Information: Dial 100 and
ask for Freefone Prestel
sales.
MICRONET 800. An
organisation providing
information within the
Prestel database specifically
aimed at microcomputer
users. Service details as
Prestel. Cost :£50-£75 joining
fee (covers acoustic coupler
andsoftware—fora limited
rangeofmachinesat
present) and £8 per quarter
ontopof normal Prestel
charges. Information:
Micronet800,8Herbal Hill,
LondonEC1R5JB.Tel: (01)
8373699.
Subscriber
business systems
in the UK
TELECOM GOLD. Info from:
Julie Ireland,42 Weston
Street, London SE1 3QD.Tel:
(01)4036777.
COMET. Message handling
system giving userfacilities
for leaving and retrieving
messages: costs £30 per
month.Infofrom: John
Douglas, BLSystems
Limited, Grosvenor House,
Prospect Hill, Redditch,
Worcs.Tel: (0527)28515.
*RING-BACK SYSTEM —
dial the number, let phone
ringonceandthen ring back.
US Bulletin Boards
TYPE
SYSTEM NAME
TELNUMBER
TBBS
Akron, OH
216-724-2125
TBBS
Amarillo, TX (Berg Board)
806-374-9711
TBBS
Amherst, NY
716-631-8845
TBBS
Ann Arbor, Ml
313-662-8303
TBBS
Austin, TX
512-385-1102
TBBS
Baton Rouge, LA
+ 504-926-0181
TBBS
Baton Rouge, LA(LNW/SE)
+ 504-291-4331
TBBS
Boston, MA(HubGraphics)
617-569-9140
TBBS
Bremerton, WA
206-692-8408
TBBS
Camp Hill, PA (CAPTUG BB)
717-774-6543
TBBS
Cary, NC (Orch-80/85/90)
919-467-7919
TBBS
Chicago, ILfAurora Computer)
312-897 °037
TBBS
Chicopee, MA (Apollo Sys)
413-594-2524
TBBS
Colorado Springs, CO
303-632-3391
TBBS
Colorado Springs, CO (WP)
+ 303-574-1615
TBBS
Colorado Springs, CO
303-598-4500
TBBS
(HQ) Denver, CO (TBBS HQ)
+ 303-690-4566
TBBS
Denver, CO (Apparat Inc)
303-741-4071
TBBS
Denver, CO (SoftwareTech)
+ 303-695-4518
TBBS
Denver,CO (AmERICan BBS)
303-333-1132
TBBS
Denver, CO
+ 303-751-8653
TBBS
Fremont, CA(Aardwolf-80)
+ 415-651-4147
TBBS
Fremont, CA
415-797-4544
TBBS
Gadsden, AL (Infinity Info)
+ 205-543-1064
TBBS
Golden, CO (UFONET)
+ 303-278-4244
TBBS
Greenfield, Wl (CANOPUS)
414-281-0545
TBBS
Hattiesburg, MS
601-264-2361
TBBS
Hawkins,TX (MicroServe)
+ 214-769-3036
TBBS
Houston,TX
713-331-2599
TBBS
Houston, TX(Exidy-2000)
713-442-7644
TBBS
Houston,TX(FREELANCIN)
713-488-2003
TBBS
Islip, NY (The Datapoint)
516-581-0898
TBBS
Janesville,WKJ.A.D.E.)
608-752-7840
TBBS
Jacksonville, NC
919-353-0610
TBBS
Kileen,TX(Tele-Med-Comm)
817-526-5915
TBBS
Lexington, KY
** Down **
TBBS
Lincoln, MA(TheOutpost)
+ 617-259-0181
TBBS
Linden, NJ
+ 201-486-2956
TBBS
Liverpool,England
+ 051-428-8924
TBBS
Long Island, NY
+ 516-467-6545
TBBS
Memphis, TN
901-358-8227
TBBS
Metuchen, NJ
201-494-3649
TBBS
Milwaukee, Wl (BeerCity)
414-355-8839
TBBS
Montgomery, AL
+ 205-288-1100
TBBS
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
514-252-8645
TBBS
New York, NY (People-Links)
212-877-7703
TBBS
Orlando, FL
305-644-8327
TBBS
Plattsburg,NY
518-563-0494
TBBS
Ravenswood,WVA
304-273-4136
TBBS
Riverside, CA
714-359-1586
TBBS
SanAngelo,TX
915-942-8035
TBBS
Shreveport, La
318-635-8660
TBBS
Springfield, MA
413-733-1749
TBBS
Staten Island, NY (SISTER)
212-442-3874
TBBS
Summerville,SC
803-871-3468
TBBS
Tacoma, WA(Corvus Support)
206-756-0448
TBBS
Tacoma, WA (CORK BOARD)
206-472-9884
TBBS
Tacoma,WA
206-535-2837
TBBS
Tulsa, OK(TBBSTULSA)
918-749-0059
TBBS
Tulsa, OK (Tulsa Info Exch)
918-438-3363
TBBS
Tyler,TX
214-566-1374
TBBS
Waltham, MA
. 617-899-6524
TBBS
Washington, DC
301-681-5065
TBBS
Wausau, Wl#1
715-352-2093
TBBS
Wausau, Wl #2
715-848-3415
TBBS
Wenatchee, WA
509-663-0792
TBBS
WinterPark, FL(OMNI-BOARD)
305-645-5543
TBBS
Woodhaven, NY(RainbowConn)
212-441-3755
TBBS
Yaphank, NY (LNW BBS)
516-824-8115
4* = 24hoursystem
PCW109
Could this be
the biggest selling
disc since
White Christmas?
Program
Symphony
3 nd COMPAQ I
a*** 91 **-*
JlCompulct*
0 Lotus
A few months after its release,
the latest disc from Lotus' M is now
romping up the charts.
Symphony™ is
the follow-up to that
other catchy num¬
ber; the Lotus 1-2-3,™
itself the biggest
selling integrated soft¬
ware disc of all time.
But Symphony’s
success isn’t altogether
surprising. It takes the
proven benefits of 1-2-3
then adds a few ideas of its own.
The spreadsheet, for instance,
is even bigger (8192 rows by 256
columns, to be precise).
The database is even better Its
graphics verge on the artistic (bar
charts, line charts, not to mention
exploded pie charts). All in colour
Next, Symphony throws in
word processing that matches the
speed and the power of any
popular WP program.
It adds communications that
let you chat with computers
anywhere.
And to cap it all
you can put every¬
thing on the screen
at the same time.
So that when you
change the numbers
in one window the
graphics change in
another
But for all this,
„ 4 ^ is easier to learn and
simpler to operate than programs
that do half as much.
To find out more about
Lotus Symphony and the
name of an authorised dealer
call Teledata on 01-2000200.
It may not capture hearts in
quite the same way as Bing’s disc,
but for millions of executives it’ll be
music to their ears.
■■Lotus
The hardest working PC software in the world.
SYMPHONY NOW AVAILABLE FOR THE IBM* PC AND XT.™ COMPAQ™ AND 100% IBM COMPATIBLES 123 NOW AVAILABLE FOR THE IBM PC AND XT. COMPAQ. OLIVETTI™ M24 IOC* IBM COMPATIBLES DEC RAINBOW - WANG PROFESSIONAL™ AND Tl PROFESSIONAL COMPUTER ™
ARE YOU AFR/
MIGHT BUI
WRONG COM
YOU SHOUI
There are many ways you can get
stuck with the wrong computer.
You can buy one simply because it
has a familiar name. Or it looks nice.
Or somebody you know has one and
speaks kindly of it
HOW TO APPROACH THE PROBLEM.
We suggest the first priority for any
business person is to determine whether
or not they would profit from having a
computer.
If it can't be proved that you would,
forget the whole subject
CAN WE PROVE YOU NEED ONE?
Explain how your business operates,
and our consultants
can demonstrate the
part computers could
play. They'll explain how the
right model for your purpose
combines with the appropriate software
program. And they will teach you to
operate it
They will balance the time and
efficiency to be gained against the invest¬
ment required.
If the case is made and you decide to
buy, we will install the computer, train
your people to use it and provide service
and maintenance.
WHY COME TO COMPUTERWORLD?
We are backed by ACT who
make the award-winning Apricot range
of computers, and distribute the Sirius,
which has already sold over 25,000 units
in this country. Aren't we bound to
recommend one or
the other?
The short answer is
yes, because we believe
ACT 16 bit computers
o U.LC/Of ill LiilO ^WUllLl J • 1 Y_l
CCWIPUrER
WORLD
WE TALK BUSINESS, NOT COMPUTERS.
BRISTOL 1 Clifton Heights, Triangle West, Bristol. Tel: 0272 277104 • CAMBRIDGE Mitcham’s Corner, 1 Milton Road, Cambridge. Tel: 0223 66444 • CRAWLEY
Tel: 031-337 9870 • ENFIELD 489 Hertford Road, Enfield. Tel: 01-805 0903 • GLASGOW Anderston Centre, Argyle Street, Glasgow. Tel: 041-221 8413 • LIVER
Reading. Tel: 0734 508787 • SHREWSBURY Park House, 38 Abbey Foregate, Shrewsbury. Tel: 074 3 68167 • SOUTHAMPTON 5 London Road, Southampton. Tel:
Hazeldine House, Telford Town Centre. Tel: 0952 506664 • WOLVER
ID YOU
THE
*UTER?
5 BE.
Both advance the state of the
art in their own way.
We know that many people
hold back from buying a com¬
puter now because something
better may come along the
moment after they've put their
money down.
Don't make this mistake.
If a computer will save your
business money, buy it now.
You will amortise the cost
very rapidly. Our prices start at
around £1,000. If a computer only
saves you £40 or so a week, it
won't take many months to pay
for itself.
TACKLE THE COMPUTER
DILEMMA RIGHT AWAY.
are easier to use and better value than
competing computers.
We will be happy to compare them
with any other make to prove our point
Evidence that we aren't alone in our
opinion lies in the fact that ACT sell
more 16 bit computers than anyone else
in the UK.
We also sell the ACT range of Pulsar
and Apricot software which constitutes
a library of published, business software
as large as you'll find anywhere in Britain.
WILL THEY BRING OUT
A BETTER ONE NEXT WEEK?
ACT is a forward looking company
with a vigorous research and develop¬
ment programme who aim to be at least
a year ahead of their competitors.
They've just announced the amaz¬
ingly user friendly Apricot FI computer
and the new Apricot Super Portable.
Call your nearest ACT Computer-
World (the number is below).
It could be obvious that you can't
benefit from a computer and need waste
no more time on the subject
On the other hand you may benefit
enormously.
It’s time you cut through the con¬
fusion and got the answer.
You could be losing money daily.
If you prefer, send the coupon and we
will send you more information.
n ACT ComputerWorld Limited, ComputerWorld House, 43 Calthorpe |
Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 ITS. Tel: 021-455 8484.
□ Please send me further details on the Apricot range of products.
T Please send me further details of the other products and services you
can offer my business. □ Please keep me informed of future events at
my nearest ComputerWorld store.
Name
Position
Company
Address
Teleph one No.
| Te t
PCW9/84
'M |
14 High Street, Crawley. Tel: 0293 543301.DERBY 10 Friar Gate, Derby Tel: 0332 43090 • EDINBURGH West Coates House, 90 Haymarket Terrace, Edinburgh.
D OOL Churchill House, Tithebarn Street, Liverpool. Tel: 051-2361112 • NUNEATON 46 Church Street, Nuneaton. Tel: 0203 328967 • READING 70-72 Kings Road,
3703 336344 • STOCKPORT 68-70 Lower Hillgate, Stockport. Tel: 061-480 2822 • SWINDON 8 Sheep Street, Highworth, Swindon. Tel: 0793 762449 • TELFORD
HAMPTON Security House, Cleveland Street, Wolverharripton.Tel: 712121.
COMMUNICATIONS
‘Pack of lies’
There has been so much
correspondence recently
regarding the problems with
the Sinclair QL that the
continuing problems of
Spectrum owners are in
danger of being overlooked.
I am a Spectrum owner and
over the sixteen months I
have had my Spectrum I have
been very pleased with it. I
have, however, found loading
my software from tape a
time-consuming and
frustrating business. Like
many other Spectrum owners
one of the reasons why I
chose to buy a Spectrum was
that Sinclair Research stated
that microdrives would
shortly be available and
would enable quick reliable
loading and saving of
programs and data. I waited,
patiently at first, impatiently
as time passed with no sign of
the microdrives.
In September last year I
finally received a letter from
Sinclair Research, signed by
Nigel Searle. It was a standard
letter presumably sent to
thousands of Spectrum
owners. It stated that the
microdrives were available
and it included the following
paragraph:
'The fact that you are
receiving this announcement
means that we have your
name as a registei ed
Spectrum owner; and is your
guarantee that as soon as
your turn comes you will be
sent a microdrive order form.
Please don't try to order
before you receive an order
form .'
The letter concluded by
saying:
'As soon as we have
enough microdrives, we'll be
in touch with you.'
I resigned myself to a
further wait. Hearing that the
waiting list was down to a
mere fourteen months by
December, I expected to
receive my promised order
form in March. You can
imagine my surprise when I
learnt in April that the
microdrives were in the shops
PCW welcomes correspondence from its readers but we must warn
that it tends to be one way! Please be as brief as possible and add 'not
for publication' if your letter is to be kept private. Please notethatwe
are unable to give advice about the purchase of computers or other
hardware/software—these questions must be addressed to
TonyHetherington (see 'Computer Answers' page). Address
letters to 'Communications, 'Personal Computer World, 62 Oxford
Street, London W1A2HG.
and I had heard nothing from
Sinclair Research. I was even
more surprised to learn that
the Interface 1 (without which
any microdrive is, of course,
useless) had increased in
price from £29.95 to £49.95 —
an increase somewhat greater
than would be expected from
the rate of inflation!
I wrote to Sinclair Research
asking for an explanation and
was informed that the
microdrive and Interface 1
became freely available upon
request in February and that
the price increase took effect
on 1 April.
I wrote again pointing out
that I had been guaranteed
that I would be sent an order
form when my turn came and
that I had been specifically
told not to try to order before I
received an order form and
that it was therefore
ridiculous to say that they had
been freely available since
February. Not only had Nigel
Searle's 'guarantee'
unnecessarily delayed my
acquisition of a microdrive
and Interface 1 but now I was
expected to pay an additional
£20 as well. Needless to say
this and further
correspondence have failed to
produce any satisfactory
response.
The conclusions to be
drawn from this would appear
to be:
1) Any written guarantee from
Sinclair Research is totally
worthless.
2) Any concern expressed by
Sinclair Research for
customers who have been
patiently waiting for their
products is a pack of lies
merely issued to reduce
customer complaints.
3) Any price quoted by
Sinclair Research for its
products will, without warning,
be increased to the maximum
that it is believed the market
will bear without warning.
Alan Harwood, Birkenhead,
Merseyside
Soggy jargon
With reference to Banks'
Statement, PCW, July: The
number of jargon words ... is
inversely proportional to the
square of the
misunderstanding ...' So,
the more jargon, the less
misunderstanding? '... more
tightly defined ...'? Banks
hoist with his own verbiage,
more like!
Let us be clear: technical
terms, used sparingly and
directly, are not jargon.
The 'interface between CPU
and disk drive' (for disk
controller) is good, precise,
technical English.
The 'interface between
education and industry' (for
where they meet) is soggy
jargon.
Terms start sharply defined,
like new-minted coins. They
are debased into jargon when
used, first loosely, then in
vague imagery, finally to look
clever.
JS Paine, Rhyduchaf,
Gwynedd
Array
passing...
With reference to the article in
PCW, July, on array passing
procedures, I was surprised
by your concluding comment
that other versions of Basic do
not include this facility.
In fact, array passing is a
feature of Basic sub-programs
in Extended Basic for the Tl
99/4 A.
Surely this can't be the only
Basic to include this facility?
Roger Hadfield, Macclesfield,
Cheshire
... exception
I was interested to read the
article by Andrew Bangham in
the July issue of PCW
concerning array passing to
procedures in BBC Basic.
I would take issue with the
point that the program will
not work on a 6502 second
processor. I have tried it and it
does! In general the author is
right to assume that direct
memory 'POKEing' and
'PEEKing' will invalidate a
program for use in a second
processor. However, in this
case, the program POKEs and
PEEKs locations which are set
up by Basic itself— namely
the variable pointers in page
&400. As Basic is copied
across into the second
processor, it expects its
variable pointers to be in page
&400 in the second processor,
and therefore, paradoxically,
direct memory access is the
correct way to access the
locations. If you try to use the
legal OSWORD call with A=5
(call to read the I/O processor
memory) then the program
will not work, as page &400 in
the I/O processor contains
TUBE handling software
when the second processor is
active. I suppose this is the
exception which proves the
rule!
Robin Newman, Director of
Software, Oundle School,
Peterborough
The eternal
triangle
I am in the initial stages of my
research into the effects of
excessive computer usage:
the problems of the computer
'junkie'.
We are all well aware of the
positive benefits flowing from
the new technology but there
are many fears that, if
misused, it can inhibit social
development in some young
people so that they become
social outcasts. There are also
instances where marriages
have failed because the
husband has become
obsessed by the computer. It
appears that the 'other
woman' in the eternal triangle
is being replaced by a
microcomputer. As yet I have
not heard of a single female
so affected, an issue which
also needs careful
investigation.
This contemporary problem
is causing great concern in
many quarters; and research
has been set up to investigate
the extent of the problem, the
types of people likely to be
affected and its influence
114 PCW
within the family.
I would like to get into
contact with individuals or
families who have direct
experience of this problem to
see how they have been
affected.
Margaret A Shotton,
Loughborough University of
Technology LE11 3TU
(I thinkthis one's for real — Ed.)
‘Unfair and
inaccurate’
When you publish a review of
a new micro it is your
responsibility to ensure that
such articles are fair and
above all factually accurate. I
believe that your review of the
Advance 86B in the July issue
of PCl/Vfailed on both counts.
Although it will not be
possible to undo the
commercial damage the
article will already have done,
I hope you will give equal
prominence to correspond¬
ence which balancesthe
distortions with facts.
The author was
disappointed with the
keyboard. That is fair, if
subjective, comment. But to
describe the keyboard as
'appalling' is unfair. Was he
disappointed at first then
appalled after he had gashed
his thumb? In a June review a
rival magazine described the
keyboard as 'well-made' and
the keys 'silent and with a
positive feel'. My view is that
the IBM keyboard is
marginally better.
The Advance disk system is
described as a 'great hulking
brute of a machine which is
not portable by any stretch of
imagination'. I have never
seen the Advance 86B (or the
IBM PC for that matter)
advertised as a portable. Also
I measured the office IBM disk
system at 16in x 19V2in
overall, which equates to a
desk area of 312ins 2
compared with 314ins 2 for the
Advance 86B. The height of
the Advance disk system
means that the monitor is
ideally located at eye level
and the bottom section, which
the IBM lacks, is a perfect
dust-free housing for the
keyboard. It is not as sleek as
the IBM disk system but
personally I do not thinkthat
wind resistance is too
important.
I could not understand the
'bug' allegedly associated
with DOS 2.11. All I know is
that my DOS 2.11 does not
have the bug described.
The omissions in the price
comparison between an IBM
PC and the Advance 86B were
so conspicuous that they
must have been deliberate. To
be objective the author
should at least have
compared like with like. For
example, he should have
explained:
i) that at the price he quoted
the IBM has only 64k RAM
and is therefore useless for
many business software
packages;
ii) that an extra colour card is
required to bring the IBM PC
to the same spec as the
Advance; and
iii) that if a 16-bit processor is
installed in the IBM an add-on
box is required (and what of
desk space then?).
The software package
supplied with the Advance is
dismissed because it's 'free'.
Well, most people who buy a
business machine will require
some if not all the packages
provided. Therefore, if you
buy an IBM PC you will be
faced with an additional
outlay of between £175 or
more (for a decent word
processing package alone) to
£750 (for a suite of software
packages similar to that
included in the Advance deal).
Actually, the Perfect software,
although perhaps not the best
available, is an extremely
powerful and professional
software package. Choosing a
business system based on the
Advance 86B compared with
the IBM PC route has saved
me at least £1200.
Finally, the author was
dubious about the support
that WH Smith is likely to be
able to give. Well, so far the
support I have had from WH
Smith in Croydon has been
excellent and very
knowledgeable. It seems to be
making sure that the serious
business computer side of
their business is appropriately
staffed.
Anthony Bretherton, Epsom,
Surrey
(From the number of letters
and phone calls we've
received from contented
Advance users , it's clear that
Surya is in the minority in his
opinion of the machine. Any
other views? — Ed)
Patience and
promises
I write concerning my request
for Oric Products International
to upgrade the ROM in my 48k
Oric-1 computer. The order
for the computer was made in
February 1983 on an order
form supplied by PCW, to
which I subscribe.
The computer was received
in April 1983 and apart from
other errors it simply would
not load. By late August a
replacement machine had
been received; the
recommended price had
started to fall and settled at
£130, a fall of £40.1 continued
with my faith in the Oric-1 and
registered the guarantee from
29/8/83, the date of receipt.
The machine still suffered
some load problems but none
with my hi-fi cassette deck
which I now use (a new
recommended Ferguson is
still awaiting its chance). Also,
as you will be aware, the ROM
still held bugs so now, not
trusting Oric to reply to my
letters, I telephoned a number
of times from September to
November. The outcome was
the assurance that Oric
accepted that the faults made
the Oric-1 fall below the early
advertised claims, and that it
planned to replace the ROMs
when the new ROM was
perfected and would I please
be patient.
I wrote to Oric when news
of the ROM was released. The
response received three
months later, as I was
preparing this letter, is a
standard offer to upgrade to
Atmos standard for £60.
Considering the delays,
inconvenience and promises
made, plus the fact that the
price was reduced by the time
a working computer was
received, I consider that for
me, a full upgrade should
only cost £20. Indeed, I would
not want to pay more.
I feel that all original mail
order customers should be
offered a simple ROM and
manual only upgrade for a
basic cost (for example, £10
including postage and
packing). This would certainly
satisfy my complaint and
produce the computer which I
paid for.
Robert MacLaren, Wilmslow,
Cheshire
Mistaken
identity
I read with interest your
review of the new HP110
portable computer {PCW,
July). Harris Semiconductor
worked closely with
Hewlett-Packard for two years
on the development of this
product which uses several of
our 'state of the art' CMOS
integrated circuits. I was
rather disappointed, however,
that the three references
made to the HP110's
microprocessor gave the
impression that this device
was manufactured by Intel.
Harris Semiconductor has
pioneered the development of
advanced 16-bit CMOS
processors, and while it's true
that Intel has agreed to be a
second source it is still some
time away from shipping
anything.
Users of the HP110 may
have little interest in knowing
the manufacturer of the chips
used. However, your
magazine is probably unique
in its class in that it is read by
many electronic and system
design engineers in the
electronics industry who
would be very interested to
know that Harris products are
used by Hewlett-Packard.
The next few years will see
a large number of portable
micros come onto the market,
many of which may use the
Harris 80C86 or 80C88
processors, so hopefully
Harris will eventually be
recognised as the supplier
and not Intel.
Steven Bennett, European
Applications Manager, Harris
Semiconductor, Slough
Multi-lingual
terminals
Good news for Mr Reekie of
Brussels and others seeking
European keyboards from
British suppliers (PCW, July)!
The ICL 6402
(monochrome) and 6404
(colour) terminals can support
PCW 115
COMMUNICATIONS
English, American, German,
French, Swedish, Finnish,
Danish, Norwegian, Dutch,
Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
or Canadian French. They use
an azerty layout for the tw j
French versions and an
awerty layout for Italian.
Accented characters are
produced by a single
keystroke.
These terminals are
normally used in association
with our multi-user PC but
could be used in association
with other suitable systems
having an RS232C interface.
Chris Haynes, Product
Strategy Manager, ICL Small
Systems Business Centre,
Bracknell, Berks
On the
contrary...
Your contributor Guy Kewney
seems to have some
unfortunate misconceptions
regarding telesoftware sales
on Micronet 800.
His news item 'Software by
post' in the July issue
contains a couple of the most
apocryphal statements on the
subject to date.
Contrary to his beliefs — or
those of the unidentified
software companies that he
quotes — we can and do
guarantee to monitor the
number of sales accurately.
Indeed, within the Prestel
context it is impossible not to.
The second statement is no
more than fallacious. Our
telesoftware is no less
protected than the majority of
cassette and disk-based
commercial software.
As Mr Kewney himself has
commented, nothing stops
the most determined pirates.
Adam Denning, Software &
Technical Editor, Micronet
800
(How about releasing some
downloading sales figures ?—
Ed)
Permanent
solution
The proposed sideways ROM
standard from BEEBUG for
the BBC Micro seems to have
overlooked the following
important points:
1 It assumes only 26
companies will develop
ROMs. This is highly unlikely,
especially with the new
American market
encouraging even more firms
on both sides of the Atlantic
to develop ROMs.
2 Different ROMs from the
same company featuring
identical commands will have
the same problems. For
example, the'MOVE'
command in Disk Doctor and
Caretaker, both from
Computer Concepts.
3 It does not help any user
with ROMs issued before the
proposed arrangement. As
there are over 300,000 BBCs
in use, this could lead to
hundreds of thousands of
ROMs and possibly their
manuals needing
replacement (no doubt at an
extra cost).
I have found a far more
flexible solution at a
reasonable 'one-off' cost
suffering from none of the
above disadvantages. The
'ROM Manager' ROM
package, recently released by
Watford Electronics enables
any command on any ROM to
be accessed directly, and also
offers many other useful
features.
This permanent system
would seem a better solution
to a constant problem than
the proposal by BEEBUG,
which apart from creating its
own inherent problems totally
fails to take into account the
ROMs already in circulation.
D Squire, Barnsley, S Yorks
Computers in
social work
In the autumn I am proposing
to publish a quarterly
newsletter on the use of
computers in social work
entitled Computer
Applications in Social Work.
The publication will
encompass as wide a variety
of issues as possible
including computers used: as
management tools; for direct
work with clients; for research
and education; and to cover
ethical issues such as
confidentiality.
Please write to me, for
further information:
Stuart Toole, Dept of
Sociology, City of
Birmingham Polytechnic,
Perry Barr B42 2SU
Software in the
driving seat
With reference to the article
'Dial-up comms software'.
Newsprint, PCW, June, I
would like to point out that
the ACT Internal Modem is
supplied with a software
driver. Both conform to CCITT
V25 auto-answer
recommendations and
approval for such has been
granted. This allows the
application writer to use the
modem in auto-answer mode.
ACT's own Apricot
Asynchronous
Communications Package
aims to provide an
auto-answer capability.
ACT's modem is not
restricted to use with
MicroMail, a software
package enabling the user to
send electronic mail via
Telecom Gold. This network is
neither designed for nor
capable of dialling a user
computer as it's based upon
dial-up of a mainframe.
Jon Upton, Group Marketing
Technical Manager, ACT,
Birmingham
BLUDNERS
Lorcan Mongey has written in
tosaythathefoundthearticle
on BBCarray passing
procedures (PCW, July) most
convenient, as it solved a
problem he was having atthe
timedefining complex
numbers on the BEEB.
He acknowledges that
although arrays and variables
are passed correctly to and
from procedures,theoriginal
dummy variable vector isnot
restored on leaving the
procedure. He saysthiscan
be demonstrated inthe
1 %
1290 l%=&400+2*ASC(A$)
1300 J%=! 1% AN D &FFFF
1390 l%=&400+2*ASC(A$)
Thankyou, Lorcan.
Atypesettingerrorcreptinto
theJulyissueinthe
explanationof'Parity'in
Networks.
ASCIl'K'islOOIOI 1,not
0101010. The MSB (bit8) will
bel orOdependingonwhether
oddoreven parity isselected.
Andforthoseofyou
following theTeach Yourself
Lispseries,thelastlineonFig1
shouldread:
(Eggs Milk Coffee)-
► (Milk Coffee)
'rest'
sampleprogrambelowby
addiag, for example, the line
0 wexample = 42
tothelistingand runningthe
program. Although itappears
to work properly, typing
"PRINT wexample" givesthe
"Nosuch variable" message,
proving thatthevectorfor
variables beginning with lower
case w has not been restored
by PROCendproc.
Lorcan saysthiscan be
corrected by typing in:
210 LOCAL I, sum, B%,C%
310 PROCendproc
("xaddmean",C%)
1030 LOCAL B$, C$, L%, N%,
Finally, Spectrum Wide
Screen Editor in the May issue
can be enhanced asfollows:
Omitlines 1033and2041:
change 1032 and 2040as
follows:
1032 LETV=INT(PEEKa/k): IF
V=2*!NT(V/2)THEN LET
k=PEEKa + k
2040 LETV=!NT(PEEKa/k): IF
Vo2*INT(V/2)THEN
LETk-PEEKa-k
These modifications avoid
logic errors which could arise
inblockhandling.
Many thanks to our readers
forsendingintheabove
corrections.
Kit
\) M If *' 1 t
'Apparently Big Brother isn't some new hardware but
some character in a book.'
116 PCW
SHOW PREVIEW
Samping the ware
Onceagaui PCW S/iowf/roe/sa/mosfE/ponus. B/ggerandbefterfhanev/er
before^here^a f^retaste^fwliatwe_'vegotmstore foryotj , ,.
If you didn't die of
suffocation at the
Barbican last year,
now's the time to
start planning for
September's PCW
Show. It's being
held at Olympia so
you're guaranteed
room to move —
and you're also
guaranteed an in¬
teresting time,
whether you're
keen on home or
business com¬
puting.
If you want to
take a look at the
most advanced
products avail¬
able, try the Lead¬
ing Edge stand
where our selec¬
tion of the best
software and hardware will be on
display.
If your interests are centred more on
business, take your pick from industry
giants like ICL down to independent
software suppliers like Anagram Sys¬
tems. Lotus Development Corporation
will also be there, flying over from the
US to show its business software.
Likely to steal much of the attention at
the Show is ACT, exhibiting its range of
machines aimed at bridging the gap
between the home, educational and
business markets. Lessthan three years
ago the company only had the SirtosN
now it's offering more Apricots than we
ca n keep t rack of. grifl
The two latest models will be on
show: the portable, boasting speech
recognition and Hitachi's80-columnby
25-line liquid crystal display; and the
entry level FI. If you can t wait for the
Show, read next month's PCW for the
first full Benchtest of ACT's first micro
for under£1000.
Also scheduled for a Benchtest in our
October issue is the latest machine
from another of the exhibitors, the Plus
4 from Commodore. As ACT moves
down and Commodore moves up,
which one will be the winner? We'll give
you a chance to decide.
A stripped-down version of the FI,
under the nondescript title of the FIE
and retailing at the less nondescript
price of £795, is aimed at loosening the
BBC's grip on the education market. But
Acorn will also be there, exhibiting the
products with which it intends to fight
back. Predictably it won't be possibleto
ignore Sinclair, nor Psion — the soft¬
ware house which developed the QL's
applications software and now intends
to offer it on bigger micros. Psion |lso
fancies a share of the hardware market
and has released the pocket-fitting
Organiser to prove it.
Ifyou'd prefer something a bit bigger,
Kaypro will be there with its portable.
Bigger still? Then try the afore¬
mentioned ICL stand —- or look out for
Digital Equipment and Apple, whose
machines are rivalling the Apricots for
abundance. L jC
The UK line of resistance to the
Americans is beginning to look a little
ragged in places. Enterprise will be
there showing its much-renamed mic¬
ro. And GEC has enough confidence in
the Dragon's future to have booked two
stands for GEC-Dragon. Tandy will be
there too, but with no further interest in
the Dragon. 00
Also representing the US will be Atari
—doubtless wondering what the future
holds now that former Commodore
boss JackTramiel is in charge. Perhaps
the price of Atari software will finally fall
to the levels of
other suppliers.
For more arcade
games, try Llama-
soft's stand where
the screens will be
displaying more
llamas than resi¬
dent author Jeff
Minter can get
onto even the bag¬
giest jumper. And
to see what Japan
has developed in
terms of home
software, pay a
visit to the stand
booked by the in¬
appropriately
named Tokyo
company Hudson
Soft.
If your prefer¬
ence is for adven¬
ture or strategy
games, the choice includes M C Lothlo-
rien, Molimerx and, of course, Mel¬
bourne House.
Rivals to Melbourne House's books
include titles from Addison Wesley,
Duckworth, Shiva, $unshine Publica¬
tions and Prentic644all. The Book
Marketing Council will also be there,
promoting its selection of titles cover¬
ing a range of home computljs.
The Book Council aims to help you
find the best book, if it's advice on the
best business machine or software you
nefi, then head for the Businessman's
Advisory Centre. To find out more
about micros in general, try the
Amateur Computer Club. Or if you just
want to play games, the Top 20 Games
Centre is designed especially for you.
Nor are hobbyists being neglected:
Bicc-Vero Electronics will be there with
its range of items such as Circuit boards
and connector tools.
Remember, this is just a taste of
what's in stare. Our October issue,
which will arrive in the shops about two
weeks before the Show, will preview
exhibitors in more detail. Tickets are
available in advance from the organis¬
ers, Montbuild on (01) 486 1951, and
admission costs £3.50 with a reduction
for groups. The dates to mark in your
diary are 29 September — 2 October.
See you there. mn
PCW117
/fmasfer^offheqfvverf//cey/board/san/nsurmounfa£>/eprob/em /
give up and try a computer with speech recognition/synthesis capability. Martin
Banksadvocatesspeech, the oldestform of communication, as a viable
andjmpressiye alternative^ to hours offrustration and knotted fingers.
Once upon a long, dim, distant time
there were two hairy sort of persons
who stood facing each other, scowling.
They stood like this for some time until
one, enraged beyond containment, let
forth a strange growling sound which
scared the other so much that it ran off.
The essence of communication had
been discovered, as had its value. From
that point the human race has de¬
veloped to the stage where it has
produced a number of different ways of
communicating to complement that
firstform, vocalisation. One of the most
important of these has been the de¬
velopment of the written word and,
from that, the development of the
machines that help humans create the
words more easily: stonetablets, pens,
paper, pencils and the typewriter.
This last one brought with it one of
those inventions that is, at one and the
same time, both incredibly cleverand a
pain in the ... That invention is the
keyboard. The qwerty keyboard is the
bain of many people's lives, especially
as it has been universally adopted as
the standard form of input device for
the computer. The technical reasons for
doing this are quite sound and when the
computer was a machine that was only
used by trained personnel (either oper¬
ators and programmers or typist-
oriented key entry staff), the fact that
the keyboard was being used didn't
matter too much.
While the keyboard was being used
exclusively by those explicitly trained
in such arts, intimidation did not
matter. Now it's different. Personal
computers are everywhere. Workshop
foremen use them, children use them,
senior company executives use them.
The intimidatory value of the keyboard
has therefore become rather more
significant.
A way around the keyboard was
needed and over the last year or so
technology has come up with some
answers. The mouse is probably the
most famous so fa r and, asfar as it goes,
is an excellent tool for moving the
cursor around and entering simple
commands by pressing. (Sorry, but it
still has keys.)
Another device that has been em¬
ployed of late is the touch-sensitive
screen. This is actually a misnomer, for
the thing is light-sensitive not touch-
sensitive but, despite such split hairs, it
allows the user to point to locations on
the screen with a finger or similar
apparatus and identify tasks, functions,
windows or whatever is required.
Again this is fine as a means of
imparting simple instructions to the
computer quickly and in a form thatthe
user can readily comprehend.
Now, however,technology hascome
up with that which has long been
predicted — the form of communica¬
tions for which humans are rightly
famous. Yes folks, the gabby computer
has arrived. There are, to be fair, several
add-on units that can be bought for the
most popular personal computers
which offer some degree of speech
recognition and synthesis capability.
But one of the first to come from a major
manufacturer, to my knowledge at
least, is the latest variant of the Texas
Instruments Professional Computer.
Tl has been in the speech technology
business for some time, having pro¬
duced such famous toys as the
Speak'n'Spell educational unit. It also
produced a speech synthesis add-on
for its now defunct TI99/4a. These, it
must be said, are just kids' stuff to what
is now available. Tl has produced a
£1250 add-on board for its hard disk
variant of the machine which really
does have some interesting possibili¬
ties, and which could become the next
generation of executive status symbol.
Early versions of the speech synth¬
esis system tended to work only with
small amounts of verbosity, and the
digitised data for this was normally
held in PROM on the same board asthe
speech processor. To limit the capacity
further, the actual spoken sentences
were constructed from individual
words and phrases rather than long
word strings. This meant that the
recorded voice used in the first place
had to be flat and uninteresting due to
any intonation inevitably making a
constructed sentence sound odd.
The Tl system can now record a voice
with any necessary intonation directly
onto disk. It can then be read back for
synthesis. On a 320k floppy, for exam¬
ple,^ claims it can record 20 minutes of
continuous speech which can, as is the
way with synthesis systems, be
speeded up or slowed down without
pitch changes as required. That may
seem like a novelty but it has some
uses.
The speech recognition system can
identify some 50 different words in up
to nine different vocabularies (that is,
different individual voices). Tl has
produced a routine that allows the user
to construct a file of commands which
simulate the command keystrokes of
any application program. Therefore it
becomes possible to have the compu¬
ter recognise you saying an application
program command, 'scroll down' for
example, and execute that command.
For a large number of applications
this capability will allow quite a reason¬
able measure of 'hands-free' comput¬
ing. With a spreadsheet, for example, it
will be possible to have all the key
commands and numeric data entry
'keystrokes' as spoken commands.
Imagine it — the executive's status
machine. You will sit at your desk and
blithely say something like: 'Cell A4.
47321 point 68 return. Calculate.' The
computer, with the right programming,
will not only do the requested job but
could also obsequiously mutter 'I hear
and obey, oh Master.'
Tl has introduced, at the same time as
the speech system, a networking capa¬
bility with all the usual bells and
whistles including an electronic mail
facility. The company confirms that
there isn't such an official product yet,
but it doesn't take too much thought to
see that it should be possible to
combine speech with electronic mail —
after all, the digitised speech is just
another disk file which can be squirted
around the network.
Here is the ultimate executive's toy.
Send someone a text document and
append to it a speech file with myriad
words of comfort, clarification, excuse,
and so on. This could have some really
interesting possibilities. RTF]
118PCW
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Sony HB'75
SonyjTasestablished^nJrnpeccablej^ecor^fonnnovation^ndjvliabilJtY.
JdnyJHetherington discovers thatnotonlyis its first home rmcrq very
competitively priced but an interesting extension ofthe basic MSX design.
BENCHTEST
MSX and the principle of software
compatibility between machines have
dominated the pages of computer
magazines ever since the idea was first
conceived a year ago.
Few people doubt the reputations or
the financial resources of the com¬
panies involved — they read like an
index of the major Japanese electrical
manufacturers. Yet MSX has already
had many critics. These critics, howev¬
er, have based their arguments on the
minimum specification of an MSX
machineand havetherefore missedthe
vital point: that MSX is only a central
core around which computers may be
built.
As the first wave of these computers
begins to reach our shores, it is
becoming clear that they go beyond
that central core and contain some
interesting built-in features.
The Sony HB-75 is not only one of the
first MSX machines, it is also one ofthe
better models. For under £300 it offers
64k RAM, MSX Basic, an impressive
choice of video output, including RGB,
and 16k of built-in software.
Hardware
The Sony HB-75 computer conforms to
the MSX requirements but goes furth¬
er. Itissupplied infunctional packaging
120 pc w
PLEASE TO NOT FORGET
THAT THIS IS THE JAPANESE
i‘>E RSI ON. OF THIS COMPUTER.
[ T HE' UK VE'RS I ON HILL B E
ENHANCE I FOR THIS MARKET
SONY
Information held on the Data Cartridge
can he saved and loaded from tape
complete with a carrying handle. Open¬
ing the box reveals the micro itself,
three manuals and the TV and cassette
leads.
The review machine was in fact an
English translation of the Japanese
version and not the UK PAL version that
will beavailableintheshops. However,
we managed to get a non-working UK
version for the photographs so that you
would be able to see what you would be
The built-in programs a re selected
using the cursor and return keys
Apageofthe memo pad consists of
nine lines of 15 characters
Pages of data can be searched for or
sorted with this powerful utility
Inside: the main circuit board isdominated by four chips
buying. Obviously there are some
differences between the two versions
but I'll try to rectify these in the
appropriate sections.
The MSX standard states that the
keyboard will contain 73 keys including
the standard qwerty layout, five func¬
tion keys and a cluster of cursor control
keys. However, it is lefttothe individual
manufacturer to decide what to make
the keys from and howto organise them
on the keyboard. Sony seems to have
spared no expense on your behalf, and
has gone for the executive image by
housing the keys on a beautifully styled
unit.
The keys themselves are set into the
front part of the unit which slopes
towards the user. They are typewriter
style with a good positive feel. Sur¬
rounding them are the grey 'support
keys' which include a CAPS SHIFT with
PCW121
BENCHTEST
a built-in LED (showing
when it is engaged), a graphics^
key to obtain the graphics charac¬
ters from the qwerty keys and a suitably
large RETURN key.
The five function keys are found
above the qwerty keys and are rec¬
tangular rather than the usual square
shape. They aiso require a firmer press
to register in order to avoid accidental
pressing. Another set of such keys are
to the right of the function keys and
include an INSERT and DELETE key
which are used with the full screen
editor. Also in the group is a STOP key to
pause or stop a program, and a HOME
key to position the cursor to the top of
the screen. Furthercursor movement is
performed by the four cursor keys
arranged in a cluster to the right of the
other keys. These are a bonus to anyone
using the screen editor and can be used
in games if you haven't got a joystick.
To complete the top of the keyboard
there are keys for RESET and POWER.
These are suitably guarded by plastic
ridges to stop you from accidentally
wiping out your programs.
Finally, the rear-raised section of the
keyboard houses an MSX-compatible
cartridge slot. A second cartridge slot
can be found on the back of the unit in
the UK version which replaces the
Japanese version's I 0 port. This is
quite a sensible change since all
peripherals can be connected to the
Sony via a cartridge slot or the built-in
Centronics interface. Also along the
back is an impressive array of video
outputs and a cassette interface which,
via the lead supplied, allow programs
and data to be stored on an ordinary
cassette recorder. The video outputs
include the MSX standard RF (UHF
channel 36) and composite audio and
video, as well as the RGB output. This
isn't particularly surprising considering
Sony's interests in this field but is a
welcome addition to any machine.
The external features of the Sony are
completed by two joystick ports on the
right-hand side of the machine.
Undoing just three screws allows
access to the inside of the Sony HB-75.
This contains an internal power supply
and the main circuit board which is
dominated by four chips.
The Z80A processor is partly
obstructed from view by a sup¬
porting strut that protects the circuitry
from over-zealous keyboard pressing.
It runs at just over 3.5 MHz and has
access to 64k of RAM.
The processor is ably supported by a
remarkable chip, the TMS9918A, which
is made by Texas Instruments and is a
sprite-based display chip. It is fully
interfaced with the CPU and controls
the screen resolution, sprites, colours
and monitors, updates the additional
16k of video RAM and provides the
various video outputs.
Another chip, the PSG AY 3-8910,
complements the graphics chip and is
responsible for the 3-channel, 8-octave
sound that is a feature of the MSX
machines.
Finally, there is a 32k ROM chip. This
holds the MSX Basic and completes the
recognised MSX standard. Although
the original MSX specification only
called for 8k of RAM, all the MSX
machines that I know of have 64k,
although there are reports of some 16k
versions.
One further chip of interest, which is
unique to the Sony micro, is the 16k
ROM chip. This contains a collection of
programs and utilities held in firmware
that gives the Sony the luxury of built-in
software.
An additional piece of hardware
called the Data Cartridge should be
mentioned here. This should be consi¬
dered by Sony owners as a compulsory
optional extra as itfits intothecartridge
slot and provides instantaneous stor¬
age and retrieval of data: compulsory
because its presence brings out the full
potential of built-in software. The Data
Cartridge doesn't involve any new
technology but illustratesthe Japanese
flair for innovation. Quite simply the
one I had consisted of 4k of low voltage
CMOS RAM continually backed up by a
small battery with a five-year life — all
packed into a cartridge. The theoretical
limit would be a 64k cartridge but the
cost of CMOS RAM imposes a realistic
limit of 16k.
Although this facility is available to
the other MSX machines, so far only
Sony has given it any prominence. This
is a shame as I feel when the cost of
At the rear an impressive array of video outputs together with cassette interface
CMOS RAM falls this will become an
important storage medium.
System software
Unlike the other MSX micros which go
directly into Basic, the HB-75 displays a
menu of options when the machine is
switched on. These options are
selected using the cursor keys and the
RETURN button and include an address
book, memo pad and diary-like sche¬
dule reminder.
Such applications have always been
mentioned as uses for a home compu¬
ter but have never been realised, as the
time to load from tape has been too
long. However, Sony seems to have
found the answer through the Data
Cartridge.
Each of these programs is identical in
structure and provides the user with
screens of nine lines of 15 characters in
which to store an address, memo or
schedule. These screens of information
are given a heading through which they
can be located and sorted.
Selecting the address option takes
you into another menu of options which
stretch along the top of the screen. The
first of these is Tiles' which, when
selected, displays a list of all the
address headings that are stored in the
machine (or on the cartridge). Moving
the cursor down to the one required and
pressing the RETURN key is all you have
to do to select the screen for that
address. A nice little trick with the
address headings isto arrangethem so
that they contain the person's name
and phone number. This creates an
additional phone directory.
New entries can be made via the NEW
option by simply typing in the entry.
When you've finished, pressing ESC
not only returns you to the previous
menu but also saves it to the Data
Cartridge if one's present in a cartridge
slot.
Similarly, entries can be altered with
the UPDATE option and, as with NEW,
characters can be entered, altered or
deleted anywhere on the screen. Again
pressing ESC ends this process, but this
time you are given the choice between
keeping the updated version or losing it
in favour of the original. While updat¬
ing, you can clear the whole entry by
selecting the delete option at the top of
the screen.
The final option on the address menu
takes you to the search/sort screen.
Here you can search for a particular
address by either typing in the whole
title or a keyword. This keyword can be
any number of characters and in either
case only the appropriate files are
listed. For example, if you had stored
the addresses of all known computer
magazinesthenthe keyword 'Personal'
would produce several entries whereas
'Computer'would result in a longer list.
As you create new entries these
122 PCW
Two suspension filing
anda>^
*-TY\e easiest 3C0ess ^ any
'Tksasasr**
Excellent ptys^*
^ protection oF each
IdisKandits
valuable data
Further details from Dept PCW
235 The Broadway London SW191SD
01-540 9370 Telex 291561 ref MC2
NEC
PUBLICATIONS
30 Hour BASIC
standard, ZX81, Spectrum, Oric, Electron and Commodore 64
editions
(£6.95)
Me and My Micro
write and develop your own game programs
(£2.95)
Interfacing and
Control on the BBC
Micro
how to control equipment outside the micro
(book £9.95, cassettes £13.80, Control Kit £174.80)
From bookshops or direct from NEC
Further information from:
NATIONALEXTENSION
COLLEGE
18 Brooklands Avenue,
Cambridge CB2 2HN
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| K-Post |
Introducing K-POST
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★ Simple use of menu-driven commands
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★ Prints standard size address labels
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★ Supplied on 160K disc for PC-DOS
★ Extremely easy to use
K-POST enhances your efficiency
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Chandlers Ford, Nr. Southampton
Hants. S05 2DR. Tel. (04215) 2942
PCW 123
BENCHTEST
appear on the top of the
'files' list but there is a sort'
facility which will instantaneously
rearrange into descending order, giv¬
ing preference to either numbers,
capitals or small letters.
There doesn't seem to be a limit to the
number of file entries that you can have
unless you are using the Data Cartridge
which would impose a 4k limit — about
22full screens.Theentriescan beeither
kept on the Cartridge or saved to tape
using the transfer utility. If the Cartridge
is present then an additional tape to
cartridge utility is also available. Any
tape-saving process also includes an
automatic verify, so you should ensure
screen colours are set to white
letters on a dark blue back¬
ground, although any of the 16 colours
can be used.
The current setting of the function
keys is displayed at the bottom of the
screen. (F1-F5 are displayed, pressing
shift reveals F5-F10.) The keys are
pre-setto includecommands which are
useful to programmers and include
AUTO to generate line numbers, LIST
and of course RUN. These keys can be
easily redefined and can be used
effectively in programs via the ON KEY
GOSUB command. This command is
followed by a series of line numbers
which the program jumps to depending
The SonyHB- 75 will be a verytemptingbuyto a
first-time buyer. . . As an MSXmachine it carries the
benefits of an easy to use and powerful Basic along
with a promised glut of software. ’
that you note the tape position from
which the data is saved.
The whole process is very user-
friendly and simple to use. So simple
that I managed to discover all its
facilities without having to delve into
the accompanying Japanese manual.
Thank goodness!
The software on the review machine
still contained some Japanese charac¬
ters which won't be present in the UK
version. According to Sony the oppor¬
tunity is also being taken to improve the
machine. This will be a difficult task as
the FIB-75 already performs well. Yes,
the screen size is limiting but 150
characters should be enough for any¬
one's address, memo or schedule
reminder.
As mentioned above the memo and
schedule reminder have identical struc¬
tures butyou should usetheformerasa
notepad and the latter as a diary. Sony
included various entries already saved
onto the cartridge as examples for me
to find, including a reminder of when to
return the machine. Obviously the
software is only at its best with the Data
Cartridge which is why I referred to it as
a compulsory extra.
You can also use the Cartridge to
store a program using the SAVE "CAT:"
command. This can then be recalled at
anytime by the opposite LOAD "CAT:
Unfortunately only one program can be
stored at any one time. Flowever, with
careful planning you could have several
routines as part of a single program.
This ability to write to a Data Cartridge is
just one of the Basic command sequ¬
ences that sets MSX Basic above run of
the mill dialects.
MSX Basic is the final option on the
main menu and when selected takes the
user into the standard programming
screen found on all MSX micros. The
on which function key is pressed. This
matches the ON GOTO and ON GOSUB
commands found on other machines
for jumping to a line number depending
on the value of a variable. However,
MSX also includes the useful ON STRIG
which isdependentonthedirection of a
joystick.
These commands should not be
confused with the more powerful inter¬
rupt-driven commands which have a
similar syntax; for example, ON INTER¬
VAL. These are driven independently of
the Basic program by interruptsthat are
generated by the display chip sixty
times a second.
The ON INTERVAL command is used
to define time intervals at which sub¬
routines will be called. The time interval
is written in sixtieths of a second, so 10
seconds would be coded as ON
INTERVAL=600 GOSUB 1000. This
command would be at the beginning of
the program and would be started by
INTERVAL ON. Thereafter, every 10
seconds, the program would jump to
the subroutine at line 1000. Later in the
program it could be halted by INTER¬
VAL OFF.
Other interrupt commands include
ON SPRITE which is activated by a
sprite collision, ON ERROR by a pro¬
gram error and ON STOP by an attempt
to stop the program. The ON SPRITE
command is particularly powerful
since, without it, it would be almost
impossible to check for collisions be¬
tween the 32 sprites supported in MSX
Basic.
These sprites are just one of the
advanced graphics facilities which earn
MSX the X for extended in its name. The
others include the self-explanatory
CIRCLE and PAINT and the powerful
LINE command. This, in its simplest
form, draws a line between two points
but adding a'b'in its syntax draws a box
with two of the corners at the defined
points. Finally, add an 'f'afterthe'b'and
the box is filled in.
More complex line drawings can be
quickly created using the graphics
macro language via the DRAW com¬
mand. This is a logo-style language
which follows simple drawing instruc¬
tions. For example, U10 draws a line 10
pixels long up the screen. There are
similar commands for left, right and
down as well as the diagonals. The
instructions are placed in a string
which is then drawn. DRAW
"U10L10D10R10" draws a box. A simi¬
lar macro language controls the sound
which is then PLAYed.
The pixels referred to above are part
of the 256 x 192 graphics screen — just
oneofthree screen modeswhichcan be
selected with the screen command.
However, I would imagine thatthe 30 x
24 text mode would be dropped in the
UK version, leaving the 40 x 24 mode,
as British users will have little use for
Japanese character sets.
These advanced Basic commands
will be ample compensation to MSX
users for the relative slowness of the
Basic (see Benchmarks) and only hav¬
ing 28k of the original 64k for program
use. They will allow even the beginner
to produce remarkably sophisticated
games and programs and the more
advanced machine code programmers
will relish the 60k of memory available.
Applications software
The amount of software available for a
machine is of critical importance to its
performance in the market. A number
of technically sound machines have
failed because of the comparative lack
of software. MSX machines should
have no problem in this area because
the principal theory behind MSX is
software compatibility.
This is the quite simple idea that
software written for one machine
should work on another. The video
market is a good example of this in
practice where any VHS machine can
use all VHS cassettes (although even
in video there's the rival Betamax
standard).
The software houses obviously agree
with the principle as at the time of
Benchmarks
BM1
BM2
BM3
BM4
BM5
BM6
BM7
BM8
2.1
6.0
16.8
18.3
19.3
31.2
44.8
216.3
All timings in seconds. For a full
listing of the Benchmark programs
see 'Direct A ccess '.
124PCW
GRAPHICS
DIGISOLVE offer you a way to increase your graphics speed and resolution. Using a high speed graphics
processor, our cards draw lines and characters FAST. The graphics processor works in parallel to the host
machine and gives you the power of using a co-processor specifically designed for graphics. With drawing
rates of up to 1,500,000 pixels per second, lines appear instantly to speed up your plotting.
With the resolution, we offer new possibilities for software and systems, both in monochrome and colour
on a large range of computers.
COLOUR GRAPHICS CONTROLLER
DIGISOLVE offer you high resolution colour graphics too. Designed to plug into any computer with
a bus host adaptor. The VGP64 gives you 512 x 512 pixels in 64 colours. With its own vector
processor and 384K bytes of memory, your computer can become a sophisticated grahics system.
64 COLOURS or 8 if you insist, not many do! 4096 COLOURS now you can really paint a picture.
384K BYTES of RAM or 768K Bytes with 4096 displayed simultaneously. 2 PICTURE BUFFERS
give you help with animation. GREY SCALE OUTPUT. EXT VIDEO SYNC LOCK available for
making video tapes. APPLE, SAGE, PET, IBM, SI00, VME BUS, RS232, centronics, all have
interfaces available to make use of our fast hardware. New ones are coming along all the time so
give us a ring if your requirement is not listed.
8 COLOURS £899, 64 COLOURS £999
4096 COLOURS £2000 + P&P + VAT
The above prices are box units including power supply but excluding computer interface.
SOFTWARE PACKAGES: Painting and Slide generation, Business graphics, Architectural 3D
design.
APPLE II
DIGISOLVE s Apple II High Resolution Vector Graphics Processor card quadruples the screen
resolution and saves using up your Apple’s memory. The enhanced Applesoft support disc
supplied with our card provides powerful graphic functions and simplifies the conversion of existing
software.
512 x 512 pixels resolution. FAST 1,500,000 pixels per second. MEMORY an extra 64K on the
card. TEXT to 85 characters by 57 lines. CURSOR drawing features. SOFTWARE 18 new
functions are added to Applesoft and extra utilities too, all with source listing. OUTPUT to a dot
matrix printer or save images on a disc. PASCAL and TASC Compiles supported too.
£399.00 + P&P + VAT
SOFTWARE PACKAGES: Art and Design, Business graphics, Painting, Slide generation
packages. Architectural design and modelling, Kitchen design and
visicalc preboots.
CUSTOM DESIGNS
VDU BOARD
DIGISOLVE offer you the cheapest way to make a scrolling VDU with our intelligent 80 x 24 VDU
card. With over 50 control functions, the card works up to 19.2K baud.
80 x 24 DISPLAY optional 40 x 24 or 40 x 12.
TRUE DESCENDERS on properly formed characters in an 8 x 12 matrix.
BLOCK GRAPHICS
FULLY SCROLLING display
UP TO 19.2K BAUD via RS232 communications port.
KEYBOARD AND RS232 DATA INPUT
£180.00 (1 off) + P&P + VAT
COLOUR GRAPHICS TERMINAL
The new FRONTIER monochrome and colour high resolution graphics terminals are fully
compatible with Tek 4014 terminals at an amazing price. The high line rate flicker free monitor and
advanced electronics provide an exceptional graphic display terminal.
512 x 720 DISPLAY, IK x IK STORED PICTURE PAN, ZOOM & SCROLL to move the display
about. LOCAL EDITING with macros and software definable character fonts.
PALLETTE OF 4096 COLOURS
FLICKER FREE DISPLAY due to high line rate monitor and advanced electronics working
non-interlaced.
19" SCREEN OPTION AVAILABLE
PRICES FROM £1495.00 + P&P -I- VAT
DIGISOLVE have staff dedicated to design consultancy and are helping many industrial users with custom design packages.
Our experience in designing display equipment, character or graphic based, and microprocessor controllers may help you with
your special projects. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you require further details.
DIGISOLVE LIMITED
AIRE & CALDER WORKS
CINDER LANE
CASTLEFORD
W. YORKS WF10 1LU
(0977) 513141 (6 lines in), 513382, 510511
TELEX 557661 AGRAM
APPLESOFT IS COPYRIGHT APPLE COMPUTER • TEK 4010 IS COPYRIGHT TEKTRONIX • SCRIBE IS COPYRIGHT ECOTECH LTD
PCW125
Software for the IBM PC/XT
- A Buyer’s Guide
START HERE
First, ask yourself a few simple questions:
1. Do you want one of the best selections of
software for the IBM at your disposal?
2. Do you wish to take advantage of some of
the lowest prices available?
3. Do you want to deal with friendly, down to
earth, sales people?
4. Do you need help, advice or technical
support?
If you answer YES to any of the above, then|
move on.
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CHOICE
We stock one of the widest selections of
software for the PC including the best of
the latest releases, such as the exciting
integrated systems from Lotus and Ashton
Tate.
Look at a few of the many software
packages available for the IBM PC:
Ashton Tate — Framework: Powerful integrated
system comprising outlining, spreadsheet, database
(fully compatible with dBase), DOS access, word
processing and graphics.
MicroPro — WordStar Professional: WordStar, the
no. 1 word processing program for micros, packaged
complete with MailMerge, Starlndex and
CorrectStar (MicroPro's new, phonetic spelling
checker).
Lotus — Sm y phony : All-in-one integrated package
incorporating graphics, communications,
spreadsheet (1-2-3 compatible), word processing and
database system.
Peachtree — PBMS Led g ers: Interactive suite of
Business Management Systems. Comprising
Nominal, Purchase, Sales and Costing ledgers,
inventory management and payroll.
Sorcim — SuperCalc 2: Probably the most popular
spreadsheet package. Comprehensive, easy to use,
and very well documented.
IUS — Easy Writer: Easy writer I is IBM's choice for
quick efficient word processing, for more
sophisticated text processing choose Easywriter II.
SPI — Open Access: A six-in-one package combining
spreadsheet, 3-D graphics, word processor,
scheduler, telecommunications and information
manager.
SUPPORT
We've been helping companies for over
seven years now. We'll offer advice and
help in choosing the right software for
your application. We also provide training,
installation and maintenance.
THE NEW IBM
PORTABLE PC
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PRICE
You may know exactly what your requirements
are and simply wish to take advantage of some
of the lowest prices around, making that
already over-stretched budget go just a little
further.
Now you can take your PC with you! The Portable
gives you the same power, versatility and function
as an equivalent IBM PC. Standard features
include:
* 256K RAM
* Integral 9" amber screen
* Slimline D/S drives
* Colour graphics adapter
* Five extra expansion slots
* DOS 2.1
* Lightweight 83-key keyboard
* Fitted bag for easy transport.
The inclusion of the colour graphics card is a
really smart move on IBM's part. In the field
where you will likely just be entering data the 9"
screen is fine. Then back in the office you can
plug in an IBM colour monitor for large easy to
read characters with the added highlighting
colour gives.
All this power for only £2,195 (excludes colour
monitor) plus VAT.
framework special off sofiware
We are including Ashton T^ ort able PC or 256K
package, Framework with eve V dd a printer
PC/XT sold by fP^g^eoithe most powerful
THE NEXT MOVE
_ Dial 01-675 5325 and speak
yJ to Interam Computer Systems Ltd.
Contact us for further details or to
arrange for a free product
demonstration. We’ll also send you a
free catalogue and price list.
IMIIDAM
COMPUTER STORE
INTERAM -
- Authorised IBM Dealer 46 Balham High Road, London SW12.Tel: 01-675 5325Tlx: 8954072/
126 PCW
Aside prof He shows the ports for two jo ys ticks
writing 45 of them
preparing catalogues of
to 15 titles for release in the aut¬
umn. This list of 45 companies contains
the majority of the market leaders,
planning MSX versions of their chart¬
topping titles.
On top of those already committed
there is probably an equal number
waiting in the wings to see how well
MSX-based micros sell. Should MSX
take off, then I would imagine that the
number of titles available will be
immense, possibly even rivalling the
Spectrum's range.
It is obvious that such a large range
will includethe inevitablefruit machine
and space invaders programs which
seem to plague most micros; but then I
feel the machine's facilities will gener¬
ate more advanced software. For exam¬
ple, machine code programmers have
60k to play with which is unrivalled in
the bgme market. Similarly tne Data
Cartridge combined with a cartridge in
the second slot provides the opportun¬
ity for immediate software.
Sony 3V2in disks will be a third
medium available to software houses
and will no doubt be used to provide
MSX owners with a range of home and
small business packages including a
comprehensive CP/M library.
Another reason for the availability of
software is the help that the MSX group
is giving to software houses — includ¬
ing a full list of useful ROM calls. This
should be taken as a lesson to other
companies who try to keep such
information to themselves; which atti¬
tude is somewhat self-defeating as
without such information program¬
mers cannot best use a machine's
capabilities. Consequently, the stan¬
dard of software suffers and therefore
so does the machine itself.
Documentation
Documentation is especially important
in a machine aimed at the first-time user
and therefore should contain a Basic
language tutorial as well as machine
instructions. The task of evaluating the
Sony manuals was almost impossible
as they were all in Japanese. However,
by virtue of thefactthat Basic keywords
are recognisable, an educated guess
can be made.
The three manuals supplied were:
the introductory guide to the HB-75; an
explanation of the built-in software;
and a Basic tutorial guide.
The introductory guide takes you
through setting up the computer and on
to an explanation of the keyboard,
particularly the function keys and CTRL
key permutations. It closes with a full
technical specification and even a
vague memory map.
The second manual provides re¬
latively clear instructions about the use
of the firmware. This manual couldn't
go wrong as the programs are well-
structured and easy tofollow. However,
the manual presents it comprehensive¬
ly and includes a diagram of the tree
structure of the software marked with
the key presses necessary to move
around it.
The Basic tutorial manual will no
doubt be renamed the 'Fido' manual as
it likens the computer to a dog called
Fido who is very good at following
commands. This is quite a nice analogy
which sets the tone for a manual
blatantly aimed at children. (I was
supplied with a direct English transla¬
tion of this book which turned out to be a
competent beginners' guide to MSX
Basic.)
The main failing in the three manuals
is the apparent lack of any explanation
of the more advanced and useful
facilities of MSX Basic. For example,
there is no mention of the machine s 32
sprites, nor of the useful grapn.^b
commands or of the more involve:
interrupt-driven commands. This is •
shame since it is these facilities that -e:
MSX Basic ahead of other diaiects
However, according to Sony a toudr
manual is being prepared which shou
answer these criticisms. This manual is
said to include an explanation of each of
the Basic keywords, with discussiors
and examples of the more advanced
features.
Prices
At the time of writing exact detaiiscf the
prices of the MSX machines are sti -
somewhat vague. An early indication
suggests that they will vary between
£250 and £320. The Sony comes near
the top of this range at £299, which s
consistent with its additional features.
This price compares well with other
£200+ micros; for example, the Com
modore 64 and the BBC. The 4k Data
Cartridge costs an additional £30.40.
Conclusion
The Sony HB-75 will be a very tempting
buy to a first-time buyer, particularly if
they already own a Sony product. As an
MSX machine it carries the benefits of
an easy to use and powerful Basic along
with a promised glut of software.
It also expands on the MSX core with
the inclusion of RGB and three useful
firmware packages which illustrate the
potential of the Data Cartridge. The
3V2in disk drive will be only one of the
many peripherals available as hard¬
ware manufacturers will no doubt jump
on the MSX bandwagon.
However, it is unlikely that the
computer industry will stop developing
at its current rate. It may slow down a
little, but development will continue.
Consequently, there will always be
room for the Sinclairs as they take home
machines into the next generation.
It is debatable whether the MSX
machines will be able to cope with these
developments. Even if they don't, they
will still form a much needed base line.
[£3
Technical specifications
CPU:
Z80A processor running at 3.58 MHz
ROM:
32k MSX Basic; 16k firmware
RAM:
64k RAM; 16k video RAM
Keyboard:
73-key MSX standard incorporating five function keys and
a cluster of cursor keys.
Display:
Text mode 40 x 24, graphics 256 x 192. 32 definable
sprites, 16 colours.
Sound:
Three channels, eight octaves.
Interfaces:
Centronics (printer), two MSX cartridge slots, standard
cassette (1200 2400 baud).
Video output:
RF (UHF ch 36), composite audio and video and RGB.
Dimensions:
407 x 67 x245mm (width, height and depth respectively)
Weight:
2.8kg
FVW 127
With competition in tjw integrated software market hotting up, discerning
micro users wijjjioteasijybe^ fooledjnto buying tjre latest 'gimmick'. So, a
system caljedSMARTwoujdseem to haveajotto Ijve up to.
BillHollandputs it_ to the test
Innovative Software's SMART system
comes in three major sections which
may be purchased individually but are
intended to be operated as one large
application. They cover the areas of
word processing, spreadsheet with
graphics, and data management. A
fourth unit called Time Manager' is
available but this was not included in
the review package.
The SMART system is supplied on
five diskettes. On loading the system a
diagrammatic display of available op¬
tions appears. You either move the
cursor or press a letter-key to select
Word processor. Data manager,
Spreadsheet, or Time manager.
A 'macro' facility enables you to
redefine any infrequently used key for
the duration of a session to cover a
frequently used series of key-
depressions (for example, a set of
reformatting commands, or a lengthy
phrase like 'Associated Semi-
Conductors Limited'). The macro can
contain up to fifty keystrokes, and you
can render a set of macros permanent
by saving them for later reloading.
There is even a function to restore
temporarily the re-defined key to its
normal function for one depression
only!
Word processor
Having selected the word processing
option (if you are using floppies rather
than hard disk) you have to insert the
word processing disk in order to
continue; and similarly with the other
applications. The program then pre¬
sents the main area of window-1,
bordered and with a 'ruler' at the
bottom showing the left and right
margins and tab stops. (Further 'win¬
dows' can be separated off, with
different texts being loaded into each.)
'Word-wrap' is automatic, and as the
cursor leaves a text line after any
change, automatic re-formatting
occurs.
As you input text a small diamond¬
shaped text-end indicator is pushed
ahead of the typed text; a flashing
cursor keeps pace with it as you
continue, but if you go back into the
body of the document for modification
it leaves the diamond behind at the end.
A number of function and letter-key
options are displayed at the bottom of
the screen which are available with the
simultaneous use of the 'alternate' key
(a sort of additional 'control' key) orthe
'control' key itself. These options are, in
fact, the most frequently used subset of
all the generally available options
available through the 'command' key.
The command key options are
reached by using 'Esc'toget'command
list 1' to the bottom of the screen, after
which the use of the 7' or command key
(as with Supercalc) shifts you to the
second to fifth command lists; another
7' depression takes you backtothefirst.
A further nice touch is that the use of
'alt-x' re-presents the last instruction
used, poised for further use.
Editing text is a delight. There are
variations on the'underscore'theme —
you can underline, with respect to the
present position of the cursor, a word, a
line, a sentence, a paragraph, or a block.
Apart from this, you can also select
continual underlining of any new text
input. Text 'find' and 'replace' works
like WordStar (that is, in a convenient
and logical way), with the ability to
ignore the distinction between upper-
and lower-case, to search the whole file
onwards or backwards, ask before
replacing, and so on. The 'copy', 'find'
and 'delete' commands from com-
Thestart-up menu displays the
available options
mand list 1 have similar parameter
choices to those listed above for
'underscore'.
Another useful built-in extra is the
'compute' option; type in a formula
with all-numeric terms and the prog¬
ram calculates the answer; or type in a
list of, say, values, which will be totalled
when you have indicated the top left
and bottom right corners.
The file read and write commands are
differently organised to WordStar's,
even though they perform similar
duties. Whereas WordStar offers
D(ocument load), ''KD(one) to save, and
"KQ(uit) to abandon, the SMART sys¬
tem has 'Load', 'Unload', which re¬
moves a document from the document
window (that is, the screen) without
saving it, and 'Save', which puts the file
on disk without removing it from the
screen. If you opt for 'Unload' you will
be asked whether or not you want to
save it first.
Be warned: there is an interesting
trap in Save: if you save, you will be
asked the document name. If you try to
enter a new name, the program does
not rename the existing document, but
attempts to save a document of that
name which it assumes you have been
using in one of the alternative win¬
dows; it therefore tells you it doesn't
exist. The trick is to press 'return' on the
query without inserting a name, and the
document is then saved under its
existing name.
Another useful facility is the 'foot-
Editing textissheerdelight; with
variations on the underscore theme
128 PCW
note' function. This enables the user to
insert a footnote marker at a particular
point in the main text and link it to a
textual footnote of up to three lines'
length which 'follows' the marker
around wherever it is shifted and prints
at the bottom of the page of the printed
document.
When the footnote text has been
entered, it will not be visible when
editing the main document, so a
subsidiary of the main 'window' com¬
mand allows you to display footnotes.
The 'print' option from command list
1 gives five options: Normal, En¬
hanced, Options, Default and Tem¬
plate. The 'Template' system requires
some explanation. For each document
created on the SMART system, a
template for printing is also created
holding the specific print features to be
used for printing that document.
If you want to specify an individual
template for a document, select 'Op¬
tions' from the list, and a long list of
possibilities will be presented: a three-
line header, either left- or centre-
justified, and a three-line footer, with up
to three further (blank) lines respective¬
ly before or after; specification of the
dateforthe heading,formatted in either
alpha or numeric; lines to enclose the
document; form length and width; top
and bottom margins, and left and right
indents; and single or continuous
stationery. 'Normal' print is for users
who do not have a graphics (dot matrix)
printer, since the alternative 'En¬
hanced' printing produces italic and
other fancy styles produced in the
document with the 'font' function de¬
scribed above.
The 'merge' commands emulate the
'mailmerge' extra available on Word¬
Star. Using it you can print, either by
taking data from a file or by direct entry
from the keyboard, personalised circu¬
lar letters or other correspondence.
The 'graphics' option available from
command list 4 allows the transferabil¬
ity of data between various segments of
the sytem. This option will pick up a
graph produced with the spreadsheet
and incorporate it into a word proces¬
sing document. A further step in this
direction is the 'send' command — this
takes raw data from one member
program of the SMART suite to
another. Thus you could enter despatch
details into the data management
program, update stocks and trigger
The usual spreadsheet format; both
rows andcolumns arenumbered
re-order enquiries, then send the de¬
tails to the spreadsheet to have exten¬
sions performed, VAT calculated, con¬
ditional commands carried out, take the
result over to the word processor to
have the result tidied up and printed out
as an invoice.
Within each of the main SMART
sections (word processing, spread¬
sheet and data management) you can
run a 'project' file. This seems to be a
derivative of the 'batch file' idea in
CP/M; that is, you take a list of
commands that you frequently run in a
given sequence, and, by using the
'remember' facility, record them into a
project file. At any time thereafter you
can run the project with 'execute' and
the project name.
The only problem worth pointing out
is that the 'change-type' on command
list 4 results in a 'beep' and 'Unknown
command'. Apart from this and a few
incorrect command list references in
the manual, the word processor is very
impressive.
Spreadsheet & graphics
When the user moves from the main
menu to the spreadsheet, the screen
takes on the familiar spreadsheet for¬
mat; both rows and columns are
numbered. Less conventional istheuse
of the extent of the spreadsheet; an
economising method called 'sparse
matrix storage' reserves space only for
cells containing data, so that a thinly
filled spreadsheet is much less likely to
overflow memory. Help is at hand in the
form of a 'parachute': if memory does
fill up, the disk space available is also
used. Due to this dedication of RAM
space to data storage, a penalty is
noticeable in that any little activity like
cursor movement to outline an item on
a menu, or matrix recalculation, causes
disk activity as program sectors are
fetched and discarded — no great time
loss, however.
Formulae can be up to 1900 charac¬
ters long, and are initiated with a '='.
The worksheet has 9999 rows and 999
columns. In the spreadsheet it quickly
becomes evident that the same general
design principles used in the word
processor have been applied to the
spreadsheet — providing the same
advantages and drawbacks. For inst¬
ance, to move around in the spread¬
sheet you can use, apart from the
obvious arrow keys, the home, end, tab,
Beautifully coloured graphics: the
possibilities seem quite endless
shift -I- tab, Pgup, Pgdn, A + arrows.
The method of command entry is
normal forthistype of application: that
is, the initial choice of one of the
commands from, say, command list 3
(done by moving the cursor and press¬
ing 'CR', or by typing the initial letter of
the command), causes the option list to
be displayed and the command to be
shown a line lower in 'pale' mode.
When you choose an option, it is added
after the 'pale' command, and any
further choices displayed until the
action takes place.
Cell referencing is more complex
than in standard spreadsheeting: entry
of absolute references (that is, those
you don't want to change automatically
if you shift the cell or replicate it
elsewhere) are entered in the form
r[n]c[n], whereas the normal relative
references are entered as rncn. To add
the last ounce of complication you can
enter a mixed version such as r7c[12].
Within the spreadsheet program
there are five command lists, sum¬
moned by the use of the 7' key. For
instance, there is a 'find', but its
options vary, giving you the opportun¬
ity to specify value, text, or error to be
sought. The latter is a good idea: if
you have ever been stuck in a spread¬
sheet full of N/A's and no idea where
to start looking you'll appreciate this
facility. Having found your error you
can hit alt-E or -F to have the error
analysed. The 'help' function is pre¬
sent and functions in the same way as
the word processor's. The 'blank'
command lets you erase a block, line,
column, or, if unspecified, the current
cell.
One thing to be aware of when
selecting a 'column' to be blanked is
the request to 'Enter number of col¬
umns'. If your cursor is resting on
column 6 and you want to delete
column 3, be careful! If you specify
column number '3' (and why not?),
you will find you blank out columns 6,
7 and 8 — the three columns that
begin where your cursor is! A bit
naughty . . .
Loading a previously produced and
saved worksheet is greatly helped
with the display of the files available
on the 'B' disk. After one has been
selected you can choose between
having the file resident or non¬
resident; this means the presence of
the file in RAM or merely in a position
Database format is fixed orvariable
length —a wonderful luxury
PCW129
CALL MICROCENTRE
FOR CRQMEMCO
CR0MEMC0C-10MP
Cromemco's C-10 personal computer
includes a Z-80A microprocessor with 64K
Bytes RAM, 24K Bytes ROM, high
resolution 12" green phosphor 25 x 80
screen, detached keyboard, 5" floppy disk
drive with 390K Bytes capacity,
communications and printer ports,
terminal emulation, graphical characters,
CDOS operating system and 32K
Structured Basic.
In the C-10MP we add a software “Super
Paka full screen editor, WordStar,
MailMerge, Writemaster, CalcStarand
PianMaster spreadsheet programs,
Chess game, MoneyMaster financial
analysis andlnfoStar data base
management system.
The System One Hard Disk computer, with
an integral 21 Megabyte Winchester hard
disk, includes Cromemco's dual 68000/Z-
80A DPU processor (featured below), with
256K Bytes of RAM and 390K Bytes of
floppy disk storage.
The S-100 bus has eight card slots,
sufficient for expansion utilising
Cromemco’s range of interface cards for
high resolution colour graphics, process
control, analogue-digital data conversion
and telecommunications.
A choice of operating systems includes
CDOS, CP/M and CROMIX.
CROMEMCO CS - 1HD2
CROMEMCO DPU
Cromemco’s Dual Processor Unit is the ultimate professional
micro-computer. It combines the flexibility ofZ-80A 8-bit systems
with the speed and versatility of6800016-bit technology and an
address space of up to 16 Megabytes of RAM.
The DPU can be installed in several Cromenco computers,
including the CS-1 featured above. For larger applications we
recommend the CS-2, with up to 4 floppy disk drives, each of
390K Bytes capacity, an optional 21 Megabyte Winchester hard
disk, screen and printer interfaces plus a 21 slot S-100 bus -
sufficient capacity to cope with the most demanding industrial or
laboratory requirements.
With over 5 years experience of Cromemco systems, we I are Cromemco's leading British distributors.
MicroCentre iCromemco
30 Dundas Street, Edinburgh. 031-556 7354 / 207 Bath Street, Glasgow. 041-248 2767
to be 'run-in' from disk. The latter
choice, of course, means that you can
draw on a series of large worksheets
for data without taking up RAM at all.
(Just in case you load in so many
worksheets that you lose track of
yourself, use of the 'index' command
from command list 4 gives you a list of
all the worksheets currently loaded.
Other elaborations from the normal
approach are the two 'copy' facilities:
the standard one when encountering a
formula will copy the formula to
another cell, whereas 'vcopy' will shift
the actual value. The set of row and
column numbers can be switched off
independently of each other, and to
'open up' things the 'border' com¬
mand removes the line-border with¬
out switching off line or column num¬
bers. In doing so, however, it displays
a further two rows on the screen.
The 'F-calculator' function, avail¬
able from command list 5, is very
useful. If you have split the screen,
your values are retained in the upper
or lower screen while the part-screen
in which the cursor was positioned is
now the work field for the calculator.
The graphics (on a separate diskette
if you are using floppies) are some¬
thing else. From the moment you go
in through 'define' and see that you
can define three rows of main title,
three rows of footnote, both their
colour and font and the main title's
size, the degree of detail (and com¬
plexity) becomes awesome.
And if you have a colour monitor,
the possibilities are infinite. To give
you an idea: when you decide to add a
touch of colour with the 'paint'
routine, you can specify border, cursor
or window. If you select 'cursor' you
can then select both the cursor back¬
ground and the foreground; similarly
with the window(s).
The 'print' options are equally wide-
embracing. On selecting 'print', one
selects between 'formulas' and 'text'.
Within this choice there is the choice
between region or block, complete
worksheet and window. The output
can be sent to disk for further (word-
processor) modification or, of course,
to the printer. The final choice is the
number of copies.
The 'send' option, as mentioned
above, allows communication be¬
tween word processor, spreadsheet,
and data manager. You can, having
defined a graph from data entered
into, say, a number of spreadsheets,
shift both blocks of data and the graph
illustrative of the data into the body of
a word processing document.
In using the worksheet, I picked up a
'ghost' after opening both a horizontal
and a vertical window and 'zooming'
into one part of it. A value of 34.00
kept disappearing and reappearing as
the cursor moved around the screen. It
tlSljWARE
wouldn't stay away, but attempting to
use it in a formula produced 'error
100' in the destination cell and 'error 1'
in the narrative line. Ho, hum! Another
minor 'bug' appeared when a copy
was made of a row of values.
Although all the values had been
copied, some of the cells remained
blank until the cursor had been passed
over them, whereupon the value was
finally revealed. Very odd ... However
as soon as the windows were 'un¬
zoomed' and 'closed' all was well and
the ghosts went away.
The manual supplied for review was
a development copy complete with
warts. Diagrams were missing and,
spelling errors abounded but the re¬
lease version should be an improve¬
ment on this.
Data manager
Database work can be complex and is
probably the activity most users tackle
last.
Structuring the database is carried
out by using the 'create' command
whereupon the user will be asked to
specify whether a new structure or not
is to be used (this is in case an existing
one is to be modified). The format can
be either fixed or variable length — a
new departure for micro databases.
The British 'Superfile' works in variable
length, but most others are fixed.
As you begin to set up the fields in
the database, the next requirement
will be the type. This may be alpha¬
numeric, 'Inv name', numeric, coun¬
ter, date, time, ssn (social security
number USA style?), or Phone. The
numeric field can be input as calcu¬
lated, and the formula for calculation
input straight away. You can, of
course, use a function key to insert
fields.
When selecting key fields all fields
are displayed, with a cursor to be
pointed to the required field. There is a
minor anomaly here in that use of f 10
doesn't (as is normal) end the selec¬
tion process; you have to use 'return'.
There is also a problem; when you do
so, on occasion you end up with
screens full of the word 'Execute'
flashing past, the only way out being
to re-boot. Oddly you don't get the
chance of specifying whether or not
duplicate keys are allowed. For exam¬
ple, with 'clock no.' as the main key,
you would not want to allow duplicate
keys, but if you were also keying the
tax codes for these they should be.
With numeric fields one can specify
accuracy — that is, decimal places
wanted — and, more interestingly,
there is the idea of calculated fields.
This allows one to nominate, in addi¬
tion to the field length and type, a
formula which governs the value of
the field in terms of the values already
entered into fields in the present
record, along with constants. For ex¬
ample, if a wages database consisted
of, among other fields:
(5) stdhrs (hours at standard
rate)
(6 thalf (hours at time and a
half)
(7) double (hours at double
time)
(8) rate (the basic rate per
hour)
one can define field 9 (gross pay) as:
(9) ([5] + ([6]*1.5) + ([7]*2))*[8]
and the result is that the input screen
allows one to enter data into fields 5-8,
but not 9, but on 'return' the calculated
value of gross pay flashes up into field
9. Very neat.
On the review package there was a
problem with the 'create' function. If
an error occurred in entering a field's
details and the 'f8' 'delete field' func¬
tion was called, even though the entry
details had been cleared from the
screen they would still be in memory.
This meant that when corrected de¬
tails were input the new field lengths
were added to the deleted ones.
Another minor problem was on
'browse', where field names are trun¬
cated to the number of characters in
the fields rather than columns being
spaced out. But at least you get field
names, more than can be said for
dBasell.
Prices
The SMART system costs £635, but
£485 with proof of purchase of either
WordStar, dBasell or Lotus 1-2-3. Mod¬
ules can be purchased separately:
Word Processor £280; Spreadsheet
and Data Manager £350 each. All prices
exclude VAT.
Conclusion
Overall, this is an exciting package. It
is flexible and well-designed — with
no obvious gimmickry.
Its shortcomings? Well, a few prob¬
lems need ironing out; and the extent
of interaction between the three units
of the system is limited — multiple
word processing screens are fine as
far as they go, but a split screen with,
say, word processing on one side and
a spreadsheet on the other would be
better.
The SMART system is being im¬
ported into the UK by 01-Computers of
Battersea, who kindly loaned the re¬
view copies and manuals.
This review was carried out on an IBM
PC, but the package is available for the
IBM PC, compatibles and the Apricot.
For further details contact the supplier:
Paradigm (UK) Ltd on (01) 228 5008. BUD
PCW131
VIC 20/COMMODORE
Upgrade to suit
Are yoij tjiinkmg of upgrading your VIC20tq a Commodore 64 butafraid
qfJosmgyourexistingjDnpg^^ggestsaqujckand
painlessmetho^ igypuroidViC^rograme.
If you've upgraded from a VIC 20 to a
Commodore 64, or intend to, you may
have wondered if you'll lose the use of
your existing programs. This article will
help you to convert your programs for
the '64, which in turn will give you a
better understanding of both
machines.
Programs usually consist of one, or a
mixture, of the following five parts:
1 Theusual Basickeywords(PRINT,for
example).
2 POKEs and PEEKs into areas of
memory.
3 User-defined character sets and high
resolution graphics.
4 Sound effects and music.
5 Machine code, either as full length
programs or as subroutines for Basic.
If you use a disk drive with your VIC
you'll have no problems loading your
programs into the '64, but if you use a
cassette, life is a little more compli¬
cated. Although the VIC and the '64 use
very similar cassette systems, VIC
programs will not load off tape into the
'64. The only solution is to get a friend
(orafriendly dealer) with a diskdriveto
transfer your programs to disk and then
into the '64, where you can save them to
tape ready to convert at home.
Basic keywords
The '64 and the VIC use the same Basic
as Commodore's first computer, the
PET. Each machine has the same Basic
keywords which perform in exactly the
same way.
On the VIC, you can type program
linesupto88characterslong,butonthe
'64 you're restricted to 80 (the '64 will
run lines over 80 characters but they
then become difficult to edit).
The command most affected by the
change of machines (excluding the
above) is the PRINT statement. The '64
has a 40-column by 25-line screen
compared with the VIC's miserly 22
columns by 23 lines. This means that
your neatly formatted VIC screens will
now fill only the left half of the 64's
screen. It's a straightforward if time-
consuming jobto movethetextaround
within your program's PRINT state¬
ments to achieve a good layout, chang¬
ing TABs and SPCs to take into account
the bigger screen size.
While doing this you might be able to
use the '64's eight extra colours; these
areaccessedusingtheCommodorekey
and the number keys. (It's best to leave
re-doing the screen formatting parts of
your VIC programs until last as it's a
purely cosmetic operation.)
POKEs and PEEKs into
areas of memory
The memory maps in Figs 1 and 2 show
how different the memory maps of the
two machines are. Fig 3 shows the
differences in greater detail.
The screen and colour memories of
the two computers work in the same
way: you have to set the colour on the
colour screen before a character will
show up on the normal screen. On the
VIC, the contents of location 36879
dictate the border and screen colours,
while on the '64 they are handled
separately by location 53280 for the
border colourand location 53281 forthe
screen colour. These take a value
between 0 which is black and 15 which
is grey 3. Any program that POKEs and
PEEKs to and from the screen (a game,
for example) will have to be consider¬
ably rewritten to take into account the
'64's bigger screen. On the 64, any
moving character which wrapped
round onto the next line on the VIC will
continue moving on the same line for
some 18 characters.
Further problems stem from the fact
that the VIC's memory map changes
depending on the amount of expansion
that has been added. A program for a
VIC with 3k expansion will have to be
converted slightly differently from one
for an 8k expanded VIC (Fig 1 should be
$FFFF
$E000
$C000
$A000
$9800
$9600
$9000
$8000
$6000
$4000
$2000
$1000
$03FF
Kernel
Basic
ROM
Game/expansion
ROM/RAM
V 2 k Colour Screen
4k character ROM
512 Characters
8k
Empty
8k
Empty
8k
Empty
V 2 k Screen Memory
3V 2 k RAM
3k expansion
RAM
Ik 'reserved' RAM
$0000
Fig 1 VIC20 memory maps
65535
57344
49152
40960
38912
38400
36864
32768
24576
16384
8192
7680
4096
1024
0
38400
37888
$1000
$03FF
$0000
Kernel
Basic
ROM
Game/Expansion
ROM/RAM
V 2 k Colour Screen
4k character ROM
24k
Possible
Expansion
372k
V 2 k Screen Memory
3k RAM Expansion
Ik 'reserved' RAM
$9400
8192
4607
4096
1024
0000
132 PCW
$FFFF
$E000
$D000
8k
Kernel
ROM
4k I/O ROM
4k RAM
5 >uuuu
$A000
8k
Basic
ROM
8k
RAM/cartridge
$8000
8k
RAM
3>t>UUU
c/innn
8k
RAM
UUU
$2000
8k
RAM
Basic RAM
$0800
<tr\Anr\
Basic RAM
Screen + Sprite Pointers
IpU4UU
Ik 'reserved' RAM
$0000
Fig 2 Commodore 64 memory map
of assistance here).
User-defined character sets are
handled in much the same way by both
computers. On the '64, however, the
ROM which holds the '64's normal
character set co-habits with the '64s I/O
ROM at 53248 ($D000). If your program
has its own characters stored as data
statements at the end of the program,
you'll simply have to convert the part of
the program that reads in the data. Even
if your program accesses the VIC's
character machines for the VIC's char¬
acter set, very few changes will have to
be made. The '64's character ROM
starts at location 53248 ($D000) but
before it can be accessed your program
must 'turn off' the I/O ROM. This is done
with two simple POKEs:
POKE 56334, PEEK(56334) AND 254
POKE 1, PEEK(1) AND 251
The '64's character set can now be
extracted from the ROM. As on the VIC,
the letters are first with @ at the
beginning (at 53248 on the '64). After
the required number of characters have
been read in, two more POKEs put the
I/O ROM back in place in the '64's
memory map:
POKE 1, PEEK(1) OR 4
POKE 56334, PEEK(56334) OR 1
New character sets can be placed in
any one of seven places on the '64 but
when used with Basic location 14336 is
the best place for them. To switch from
a character set in ROM to one at 14336,
simply POKE location 53272 with 30. To
protect your cha racter set at 14336 from
being overrun by your Basic programs,
the top of Basic must be set to 14080.
This is done by POKEing locations 52
and 56 with 55, which leaves about 12k
of memory available for your Basic
program.
Computer
Extent of
Basic
memory
Position
of
Screen
Position of
Colour
Screen
Unexpanded
VIC
4069-7679
<$1000—$IDFF)
7680-8191
($IE00-$IFFF)
38400-38911
($9600-$97FF)
VIC
-f 3k
1024-7679
($0400-$IDFF)
7680-8191
<$IE00-$IFFF)
38400-38911
($9600-$97FF)
VIC
+ 8k
(or more)
4608-????
($1200-$????)
4096-4607
($1000—$IIFF)
37888-38399
($9400-$95FF)
Commodore
64
2048-40959
| ($0800-$9FFF)
1024-2023
($0400-$07E7)
55296-56319
($D800-$DBFF)
(???? — upper limits depend on amount of expansion)
Fig 3 Breakdown of differences between VIC and Commodore memory
On the VIC, high resolution graphics
are achieved by filling half the screen
with a blank user-defined character set
and then doubling the character size so
that 256 characters fill the entire screen.
On the '64, things are slightly easier in
that you put aside 8k of memory for the
320 x 200 high resolution screen. High
resolution mode is entered with the
following:
POKE 53265, PEEK(53265) OR 32
POKE 53272, PEEK(53272) OR 8
The last of these POKEs tells the '64
where to find the hi-res screen, in this
case 8192 ($2000). On the '64, the
colours for this mode are given by the
contents of the screen matrix (1024-
2023), whereas on the VIC the colours
for points which are plotted come from
the colour screen. Like the VIC, the '64's
high resolution screen is laid out as
rows of characters. To plot a point (X,Y)
on the '64thefol lowing should be used:
BYTE = 8192 + 320*INT(Y/8) +
8*INT(X/8) + (Y AND 7)
POKE BYTE, PEEK (BYTE)
OR 2 | (7—(X AND 7))
This is similar to the method used on
the VIC.
Another mode that both computers
have in common is multi-colour mode,
which allows up to four colours to be
shown in each character square. On the
VIC, this is enabled by placing a colour
code greater than seven in the colour
square corresponding to the required
character. The same method is used on
the '64 but the mode must first be
'turned on' with the following:
POKE 53270, PEEK(53270) OR 16
After the above the mode is almost
the same as both computers. On both,
the resolution of the screen is halved so
that bit pairs represent thefour colours;
the main difference being the location
from where the computers access the
colours. Fig 4 shows the differences.
Sound effects and music
One of the main advantages the '64 has
over the VIC is sound. The VIC has three
tone and one white noise channel,
giving a range of five octaves. The '64
has three channels offering nine
octaves. Each of the '64's channels can
take a different waveform from a
Bit
Pattern
VIC
Commodore
64
Hi-Res
Commodore
64
Characters
00
Screen
Colour
Screen
Colour
Screen
Colour
01
Character
Colour
Upper 4
Bits of
Screen
Memory
Background
Colour #1
(53282)
10
j Border
Colour
Lower 4
Bits of
Screen
Memory
Background
Colour #2
(53283)
11
Auxiliary
Colour
(36878)
Colour
Memory
Colour
Memory
Fig 4 Multi-colour mode bit patterns
PCW133
VIC 20/COMMODORE
A
10
K
37
U
30
/
55
6
19
*
49
B
28
L
42
V
31
£
48
7
24
(d
46
C
20
M
36
w
94
+
40
8
27
T
54
D
18
N
39
X
23
-
43
9
32
«-
57
E
14
O
38
Y
25
0
35
=
53
SP
60
F
21
P
41
z
12
1
56
fl
04
G
26
Q
62
,
47
2
59
f3
05
H
29
R
17
44
3
84
f5
06
1
33
S
13
;
50
4
11
f7
03
J
34
T
22
45
5
16
RET
01
Fig 5 Machine code value locations
selection of triangle, sawtooth, pulse
and white noise. The '64's SID (Sound
Interface Device) chip also offers en¬
veloping (where the note's shape is
changed by setting Attack, Decay,
Sustain and Release) and various fil¬
ters. Of course, when you are convert¬
ing from the VIC you'll want your
program to sound the same as it did on
the VIC. You'll be able to enhance your
VIC sounds later by using more of the
SID's facilities.
Volume control
Both computers handle the volume
control of their sound in the same way.
This is done by POKEing a certain
memory location with a value between
0 and 15(15 being the loudest). On the
VIC, this location is 36878 and on the'64
it's 54296.
Each of the VIC's three channels or
voices is pre-set to give notes in a
certain range depending on the voice.
On the '64, any note in a nine octave
range can be played through any of the
three channels. Playing a note on the
VIC is simply a matter of setting the
volume and then POKEing a number
between 128 and 255 into one of the
three channels.
This process is slightly more compli¬
cated on the '64 in thatthe SID chip has
to know which waveform is to be used
and the shape of the note to be played
before any sound can be heard. To
enable the '64 to have a larger range
than the VIC, two locations must be set
forthe pitch of each note. I suggestthat
you first setthe Attack/Decay register of
the voice you are using to 136, for
example, and the Sustain/Release reg¬
ister to zero. You should also set the
waveform of the voice to eithertriangle
or sawtooth. These values will give a
note that sounds almost like that of the
VIC. If your VIC program uses white
noise (location 36877) then set the
waveform to noise.
Once your program is running prop¬
erly you can experimentto obtain better
sound effects. The '64's User Manual
contains a chart giving the values for
the note that you wish to play.
Machine code
Converting machine code from the VIC
to the '64 is not as hard as it might at first
appear if you have a working know¬
ledge of machine code; both compu¬
ters use one of the 65XX family of CPUs.
Like the Basics of the two machines the
machine codes are exactly the same,
and if you've learnt 6502 on the VIC
you'll find 6510 familiar.
You'll find that illegal cal Is to the VIC's
ROM will not work on the '64 but legal
ones will, since Commodore has left the
Kernel jump table alone. The first 1 k of
memory is exactly the same on both
machines except for locations 0, 1,2,
784, 785, 786,197 and 203 decimal.
On the VIC, locations 1 and 2 hold the
start address for programs called by the
USR command in the conventional
lo-hi 65XX fashion.
On the '64, the two lowest locations
are used by the 6510 in the memory
paging system. USR calls on the '64's
user locations 784-786 so when you're
converting programswith USR inthem,
remember to POKE the address of the
machine code subroutine into locations
785 and 786 on the '64.
Any VIC programs that use locations
784 — 787 for storage will have to use
alternatives. If your programs use
location 197 or 203 to find which key is
being pressed,you should note thatthe
'64 reads the keyboard in a different
way to the VIC. These locations now
have the values shown in Fig 5.
Remember that on the '64 you have
4k of memory (at $C000 or 49152
decimal) set aside for your machine
code programs or data. If you have a
simple monitor/assembler, such as
Superman for the VIC, you should find
that this will work on your new '64 but
the X command (exitto Basic) will cause
the '64 to crash.
Conclusion
With the information and tables in this
article you should be able to convert
most machine code utilities to the '64,
but games and most full-length prog¬
rams will be beyond all but the most
determined 'assemblerites'.
As the '64 is a much 'bigger' machine
than the VIC in more aspects than
memory, you should try to keep in mind
when converting your programs that
you now have available a much larger
screen resolution, sprites and the ad¬
vanced SID chip.
You'll find that converting your old
programs will helpyou adaptquickly to
your new machine.
E0
'Tell me, MrVideogame, what'sitlike suddenly becoming
a household name?'
134PCW
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1HII1
Specification
Model:
CUB 1451/DQ3
14"Q.L. Monitor
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Tube Resolution (pixels)
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Bandwidth 18 MHz
Also available in Standard Resolution
version for only £225 inc. VA T.
Microvitec PLC, Futures Way, Bolling Road, Bradford BD4 7TU, West Yorkshire. Tel: (0274)390011. Telex: 517717
ROBOTICS
lb serve and obey
Meof/on rohof/csandmosfpeop/econ/tvre op madsc/enf/sfs, human fra/7fy
andworlddooiy ?. Butnightmares apart, it's an intriguing and beneficial
area ofresearcTr Andrew^angham explams howycw can setup youmwn
computer^controlled^evice using a BBC Micro.
Ever thought about building your own
toy robot or making Meccano or Lego
machines run under computer control?
What about making a mechanical
mouse wend its way around the sitting
room? All you need is a micro such as
the BBC, radio control-type servo¬
motors, an ordinary DC model motor,
some wire and a few connectors.
It is possible to control a model
maker's servo-motor directly by using a
BBC Micro, two wires to supply 5v
power and one to connect the servo¬
motor control pin to either the user
parallel port or the printer port. These
little servo-motors are delightful; small
and light enough to be used in model
aeroplanes, yet remarkably powerful.
Futaba, for example, produces a
large range of well-documented
motors. Each unit includes a small DC
motor, a gear box, a position sensor
and a feedback amplifier. The motor
usually moves a lever (via the gear box)
through 90 degrees and the internal
feedback system ensures that the posi¬
tion of the lever is dictated by the
control wire.
Servo-motors
Servo-motors are digital. To control the
position of the lever a voltage pulse (Oto
5v) is applied to the control wire; it is the
duration of this pulse which governs
the position of the lever. For example, a
one millisecond pulse commands the
servo-motor to move its lever to one
end of its throw, and a two millisecond
pulse moves it to the other end.
Sending the servo-motor one pulse
of, say, 1.5 milliseconds (to move the
lever into the centre position) will be of
little use: the motor will leap into action
but will be unable to continue. It must
be frequently reminded; and this is
done by sending a continuous stream
of pulses. If the pulses are all the same
length then the lever will remain in one
place and the servo-motor will resist
any attempt to move the lever mechani-
cally (if you force it out of position then it
will immediately return to the set
point). If the pulses are of a different
length then the motor will move the
lever to execute the command.
Amuscle is a good way of describing
the way in which digital servo-motors
work, as both require a stream of pulses
to maintain a constant position. Animal
nerve/muscle systems are remarkable
linear servo-motors. They have a good
power-to-weight ratio, respond fast
and are energy-efficient. Like digital
servo-motors, muscles have to receive
a continuous stream of nerve action
potentials in order to function: a
tetanus. In other words muscles and
servo-motors have to be refreshed;
servo-motors need about 50 pulses per
second.
Fig 1 summarises the requirements
of the servo-motor. The computer
communicates to the motor through a
port; in this case the user port. (The
printer port, however, may be a safer
choice: since the outputs are buffered,
there is less risk of mistakes in the
external circuitry damaging the com¬
puter.) Whatever happens you should
take care not to short any outputs to
ground, and not to connect any devices
with the wrong polarity. Power can be
drawn from the 5v supply in the
analogue port, though care should be
taken when using larger motors. Elec¬
tric motors constitute an inductive load
and although I have had no problems
with this, use of a diode may prevent
voltages being fed back into the compu¬
ter. Many servo-motors have a large
capacitor to accommodate the current
surges.
If the microprocessor outputs the
number 255 (&FF) all wires will be five
volts. Likewise the number 0 (&0) is
represented by all wires being set at 0
volts, and 240 (&F0) is represented by
the four most significant wires (or bits)
being set at five volts and the four
remaining ones being set at 0 volts.
When the microprocessor outputs a
number (bit pattern) this is maintained
for less than a microsecond before the
next number is arrived at. To trap the bit
pattern an interfacing chip is used (in
the case of the BBC Micro user port this
is a 6522). If the microprocessor writes a
bit pattern (thatis, number)tothe6522,
the 6522 can maintain that pattern until
it is told to change it or'latched'. In fact a
single 6522 has not just one but two
similar user ports: port A and port B.
Port A is used for the printer and has a
driver chip to send the output over long
distances, but I used port 'B' —
although more fragile, it saves having
to disconnect the printer. (The User
Guide explains how to handle the user
port on pages 435-437.)
The 6522 uses memory locations
&FE60 to &FE6F, so those addresses do
not contain memories but the various
registers of the rather complex 6522
chip. Two methods can be used to put
bytes into, or read bytes from, these
memory locations. They can be POKEd
(?&FE00=&FF) or PEEKed (PRINT
?&FE60) directly, or they can be
approached the proper way using
OSBYTE &96 for reading and OSBYTE
&97 for writing. The latter has the
advantage of being processor-
independent, so if you have a second
6502 processor system it will work.
(Incidentally, does anyone have a
second 6502 processor system?) The
former method has the adavantage of
speed and was used for this reason.
To output a value to user port B,
instruct the 6522 to switch to output
DDr
user port
UUV • 1 HVI
:
19....0v
Servo
motor
CM
CM
data
tf>
//Y
plastic “horn”
<0
6....data 0
common
which rotates
mm*
*— J 1„.,5v t
control
- \o) - J
supply
Fig 1 Requirements of servo-motor
136 PCW
Illustration by Peter Goodfellow
ROBOTICS
mode, POKE the value &FF to the data
direction register B
?&FE62 = &FF
and the pattern of voltages on user port
pins 11 to 18 will be dictated by the
value (between 0 and 255) POKEd into
the data output register B
?&FE60=value
A value of &FF (255) will make them
all five volts, &0 all zeros, and so on.
A Basic program can be written
which sets all the data pins to five volts,
immediately turns them off again and
then loops continuously to produce a
stream of pulses.
For example:
10 ?&FE62=&FF
20 NOW=TIME
30 FOR 1%=1 TO 200
40 ?&FE60=&FF :REM all on
50 ?&FE60=&00 :REM all off
60 NEXT :REM next pulse
70 T=TIME-NOW
80 PRINT 'TIME PER LOOP=";T
But there are two major problems.
Firstly, it takes too long to go round the
loop; the loop produces 20 pulses per
second and 50 are needed. Secondly,
although the pulse length lies between
one and two milliseconds, it cannot be
controlled. Inserting a couple of null
statements such as:
45 Z%=0:Z%=0
will cause the motor to move to a new
position but it's hardly a credible way of
controlling a motor. Basic can be used
to decide the commanded position for
the motor but cannot be used to drive it
as this requires machine code. No
problem: the BBC Micro operating
system makes it relatively easy to use
assembly code as part of a Basic
program which can then automatically
assemble this to machine code. Furth¬
ermore, the BBC Micro makes it un¬
usually easy to handle interrupts.
Computer interrupts
But first of all let's see how to write a
machine code program to produce a
single pulse. To start the pulse load the
accumulator (which is analogous to the
display register of most calculators)
with the number &FF (255), then store
the accumulator contents in what the
processor thinks is memory cell &FE60
but what is really the 6522's output
register. This will makeall data pinsfive
volts.
LDA £&FF /backslash starts a remark
STA&FE60/store accumulator in mem¬
ory cell number &FE60 (hexadecimal)
The processor will be made to wait
for roughly three quarters of a mil¬
lisecond by loading the Y register with
255 (&FF) and decrementing it by one,
checking to see if the result is a zero and,
if not, then looping backto decrement Y
again.
LDY £&FF
.LOOP DEY/this takes two cycles—
one microsecond
BNE LOOP /three cycles if it bran¬
ches
The total time for a single loop is five
cycles or 2.5 microseconds (256 loops
takes 640 microseconds).
To turn the pulse off after a variable
time, a loop can be used again, but
instead of loading the Y register with
&FF it should be loaded with the
contents of a variable called 'angle'.
The larger the angle, the longer the
pulse will last. Finally zeros are output
to the user port and the pulse is over.
LDY angle
.LOOP2 DEY
BNE LOOP2
LDA £&00
STA &FE60
With this arrangement the pulse can
be made to vary from approximately
0.64 milliseconds to approximately 1.3
milliseconds. Clearly this method is an
answer to the problem. The pulse can
be made longer by adding another loop
if necessary. A full working program is
given in Listing 1, but before consulting
it consider how to replace one pulse by
a stream of pulses.
A pulse must be produced roughly
every 20 milliseconds. This interval can
be timed using the event timer. Like
TIME the event timer works in cen-
tiseconds. It can be instructed to
generate an interrupt pulse whenever it
crosses zero: if it can be made to count
up the two centiseconds (20 mil¬
liseconds, or 50 per second) from
&FFFFFFFFFE to &0000000000 then
generate an interrupt and if that inter¬
rupt pulse forces the microprocessor to
reset the timer and run the pulse
generating program outlined above,
then a stream of pulses will be pro¬
duced.
The 6502 processor has a maskable
interrupt pin. If a signal is received on
this pin the processor drops whatever it
was doing and starts to handle the
interrupt. The operating system makes
extensive use of interrupts and the
machine runs under continuous inter¬
rupts — TIME is constantly updated,
bytes are transferred to input buffers,
and so on. All these things continue
even when an ordinary program is
being run or edited and are carried out
using interrupts. The BBC Micro en¬
ables extra routines to be added which
can be executed whenever the
appropriate interrupt occurs. The oper¬
ating system already recognises many
possible sources of interrupts, auto¬
matically identifies them and passes
them as 'Events'. An Event 5 is gener¬
ated when the interval timer crosses
zero, enabling and then trapping this
event is 6502 interrupt handling made
easy.
To start the interval timer it must be
given a starting value. An OSWORD call
with the accumulator (A%) equal to 4
will write a value to the timer. The value
10 osbyte=&FFF4
20 A%=&97 :X%=&62 :Y%=&FF
50 CALL osbyte:REM set up port B for
output
66 NOW*TIME
70 CLS
100 DIM timer*. 12 .read* 12
110 xtimer~timer% MOD 256
120 ytlmer=tlmer% 01V 256
122 xread~read% MOD 256
124 yread*read% DIV 256
125 PROCInitiai
130 t~02 :REM sec between pulses
140 tlme*=&FFFFFFFF ~<t*100> +1
150 timer%?4*&FF
:R£M load highest byte
170 ltlmer%*time% :REM set up timer
171 REM enable events to start pulses
174 *FX14,5
175 A%-4 :X*=xtlmer :Y%=ytimer
.‘CALL &FFF1
185 REM get ready to watch timer
186 A%-3 :X%*xread :Y*=yread
187 1*0 :value%-100
189 NOW-TIME
190 REPEAT
191 value%*128+128*SIN(i)
196 PRINTTAB(10.10)*value *’value%"
I—* I
200 ?angie-va!ue%
202 wait*TIME
203 REPEAT
204 CALL &FFF1 :PRINTTAB(2.5)lread%"
•TIME
205 UNTIL TIME>wait+10
208 I-I+.5 ;IF l>10 THEN 1*0
210 UNTIL TIME>NOW+2000
211 REM disable events
215 *FX13,5
219 END
220
230
240 DEF PROCInitiai
250 DIM space* 200
260 FOR C^O TO 2 STEP 2
261 portd=&FE60
270 P*=space%
280 angle=P%
290 P%=P%+1
300 [OPT C
310 .eventhandler
311 Vsave registers first
320 PHP:PHA:TYA:PHA:TXA:PHA
340 LDA £&04
350 LDX txtlmer
360 LDY fytlmer
370 JSR &FFF1 \reset timer
380 LDA £&FF
390 STA portb
395 \walt approx. 1msec
400 LDY £&FF
410 LOOP DEY
420 BNE LOOP
425 \and countout pulse
430 LDY angle
440 LOOP1 DEY
450 BNE LOOP1
452 \stop all output pulses
455 LDA £&0
457 STA portb
460 PLA:TAX:PLA:TAY:PLA:PLP
470 RTS
480 ]
490 NEXT C
495 REM point to eventhandler
500 !&220=eventhandler OR (I&220 AND
&FFFF0000)
510 ENDPROC
520
530
Listing 1
to be written must occupy five bytes at
an address pointed to by X%=low byte
and Y%=high byte of the 16-bit (two
byte) address. Some space for these
five bytes can be reserved with a DIM
statement.
10 osbyte=&FFF4 :REM osbyte
address
20 DIMtimer% 12
138 PCW
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ROBOTICS
30 X%=ti m er% M 0 D 256
40 Y%=timer%DIV256
50 !timer%=&FFFFFFFE :REM2
centiseconds countdown
60 timer?4=&FF: REM fifth byte
70 A%=4
80 CALLosbyte
The Basic program above will start
the timer counting down two centi¬
seconds. If Event5 isfirst enabled using
*FX14,5 then as soon as the timer hits
zero the processor will jump to whatev¬
er routine is pointed to by the address in
&220 (low byte first followed by the
high byte) (obviously the address of the
pulse generating program must be
inserted into the vector at &220).
The program shown in Listing 1 loads
the Event vector with the address of the
Event handler routine on line 500. The
Event handler routine first saves all the
registers on the stack (a last-in, first-out
buffer), then resets the timer, delivers a
pulse and finally reinstates all the
registers (X,Y,A and status registers).
The 'C' loop assembles the program; by
stepping from 0 to three, in steps of
three, the operating system is forced to
list the assembled program as it is
assembled. By stepping to two instead
of three listing of the assembly process
can be suppressed.
The Basic program sets up the timer,
assembles the Event handler, enables
the Events, starts the timer, then
repeatedly sets the commanded angle
to new values (actually a lumpy sine
wave) until twenty seconds are up, at
which point it turns off the events. With
a motor connected the motor will
followthe lumpy sine wave, moving its
'horn' to each commanded angle in
turn. Everything stops after twenty
seconds. If the events are not turned off
they will continue even though the
Basicprogram may have finished—the
servo-motor handling routine will have
become a temporary part of the com¬
puter's operating system.
This program works well but is a little
restrictive as all eight data lines on the
output port produce the same pulse
shape.
More than one motor can be handled
simultaneously by rethinking the way
in which the pulse is terminated. Clearly
there is no time to count down eight
different values, turning off each motor
as its counter times out. An alternative
method isto generatea look-uptableof
256 values; thetiming loop loading and
outputting each byte (pattern) in turn.
As the table would take too long to
produce (since bit patterns would still
have to be generated) the trick is to
utilise the 'AND' instruction. A logical
'AND' returns one only if both inputs
are ones, otherwise it returns zero (see
Fig 2).
Listing 2 shows a Basic program to
position up to eight servo-motors
simultaneously. Simple key presses
10 MODE 0
15 REM *****************************************
16 REM This is important
17 REM *****************************************
20 osbyte=&FFF4
30 A%~&97 ;X%=&62 :Y%~&FF
40 CALL osbyte:REM set up port B for output
50 CLS
60 DIM p%(8)
70 DIM timer% 12 .read* 12
80 xtlmer~tlmer% MOD 256
90 ytlmeretimer% DIV 256
100 xread=read% MOD 256
110 yread~read% DIV 256
120 PROCinitlai
130 FOR l%=angle TO angie+8:angle?i%=128:NEXT
140 t=.02 :REM sec between pulses
150 tlme%=&FFFFFFFF -(t*100) +1
160 timer%?4-&FF :REM load highest byte
170 ltimer%*time% :REM set up timer, enable events
180 *FX14.5
190 A%~4 :X%=xtimer :Y%*ytlmer .CALL &FFF1
195 REM *****************************************
196 REM this Is filler
197 REM *****************************************
200 CLS
210 PRINT'PRESS F for faster rate S for slower rate of change"
220 PRINT* 1 for motor 1 forwards 1 backwards" j
230 PRINT" 2
240 PRINT" 3 etc"
250 PRINT" L for lower pulse frequency H for higher"
260 PRINT.SPACE BAR TO FINISH-
270 PRINTTAB(25.8>"POSITION OF THE FIRST MOTOR PLOTTED AGAINST TIME*
280 PRINTTAB(25)"in this program the motor position Is controlled *
290 PRINTTAB(25)"by pressing keys, however the motors could"
300 PRINTTAB(25)-follow any pattern(s)"
310 delta*!
320 NOW=T!ME
330 motor=0 :§%*&00020Q05
340 REM layout screen, plot motor 1 angle and display others
350 PRINTTAB(0.15)"delta."
360 FOR I%*1 TO 8 :PRINT*Motor ";l%;" position " :N£XT
370 PRiNT-pulse frequency..."
380 VDU 28.17,31.79.0
390 MOVE398.98 :DRAW 1202.98 :DRAW 1202.602
395 DRAW 398.602 :DRAW 398.98
400 VOU 24.400;!00:1200,600; :VDU 29.400.100:
410 x~0 .MOVE x,2*(?angle)
420 REPEAT
430 IF IN KEY (-68) THEN delta*delta+l
440 IF INKEY(-82) THEN delta*delta-l :!F deitaO THEN delta*!
450 IF INKEYC-87) THEN t*t+.005 ;time%=8FFFFFFFF ~(t*100> +1 :!timer%=tlme%
460 IF INKEY(-85) THEN t*t-.Q05 :tlme%-&FFFFFFFF ~<t*100> +1 :ltlmer%-tlme%
470 position-FNmotor(delta) :IF position*-! THEN 490
480 p%(motor)*positlon
490 PRINTTAB(0.15)delta
500 *FX21,0 j
510 FOR l%*1 TO 8 :PRINTp%(l%> :NEXT
520 DRAW x.2*(?angle>
530 x-x+4 :IF x>800 THEN x*0:MOVE x.2*(?angle) :ELSE :DRAW x.2*(?angle)
540 UNTIL INKEY(-99)
550 *FX13.5
560 PRlNT'bye*
570 END
580
590
600 DEF FN motor (rate) :R£M returns -1 If no changes
610 REM moves motor to new position value of which Is returned
620 REM the number of motor repositioned Is returned in 'motor'
630 K%*INKEY<5>
640 IF K%<&21 OR K%>&38 THEN a*-1 :GOTO 720
650 motor=(K% OR &30) - 48
660 s=K% AND &10 :REM 0 backwards 16 forwards
670 IF s-Q THEN rate=-rate
680 a=angle? (motor- D+rate
690 IF a>255 THEN a*255
700 IF a<l THEN a*l
705 REM *****************************************
706 REM this sets angle of each motor In turn
707 REM *****************************************
710 angle?(motor-l)=a
720 =a
730
740
750
755 REM *****************************************
756 REM What remains Is Important
757 REM *****************************************
760 DEF PROCinitlai
770 DIM space% 600
780 FOR C*0 TO 2 STEP 2
Listing 2 ... continued
140 PCW
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ROBOTICS
790 zeropage^SJO :REM free for users
800 portt>-&FE60 :osword=&FFFl
810 P%-space%
820 angie= : P% :P%~P%+8 :REM potentially 8 motors
830 table=P% :P%-P%+256 :REM 256 possible pulse lengths
840 lowtabie%=tabie MOO 256
850 hlghtabie%=table DIV 256
860 ?zeropage=iowtable% :zeropage?l-hightable%
870 {OPT C
880 eventhandler
890 PHP:PHA:TYA:PHA:TXA:PHA
900 LDA £&04
910 LDX fxtimer
920 LOY iytimer
930 JSR osword
940 LOY £&0
950 LDA £&FF
960 fill STA (zeropage).Y
970 INY
980 BNE fill
990 \Start pulse, for some motors It may be possible to start
1000 \before filling table and so reduce the wait loop below
1010 LDA £&FF :STA portb
1020 Mill table with exceptions
1030 LDA £&FE:LDY angle :STA (zeropage),Y
1040 LDA £&FD:LDY angle+l:AND (zeropage).Y:STA (zeropage).Y
1050 LDA £&FB:LDY angle+2:AND Czeropage).Y:STA (zeropage).Y
1060 LDA £&F7:LDY angle+3:AND (zeropage).Y:STA (zeropage),Y
1070 LDA £&EF:LDY angle+4:AND Czeropage).Y:STA (zeropage),Y
1080 LDA £&DF:LDY angle+5:AND <zeropage).Y:STA (zeropage),Y
1090 LDA £&BF:LDY angle+6:AND (zeropage).Y:STA (zeropage),Y
1100 LDA £&7F:LDY angle+7:AN0 (zeropage).Y:STA (zeropage),Y
mo \table is now loaded, fill In some time
1120 LDY £&60
1130 .wait DEY
1140 BNE wait
1150 LDA £&FF \atl pulses on
1160 LDY £&0
1170 .loop AND (zeropage).Y \but mask off with each exception in turn
1180 STA portb
1190 INY
1200 BNE loop
1210 \aii pulses should now be finished
1220 PLA:TAX:PLA:TAY:PLA;PLP
1230 RTS
1240 3
1250 NEXT C
1260 !&220=eventhandler OR (I&220 AND &FFFF0000)
1270 ENDPROC
1280
“AND” truth table
input 1 2
output
O O
O
0 1
O
1 O
O
1 1
1
Fig 2 'AND' truth table
change the commanded angles. The
Event handler program starts the same
way as before but loads 256 memory
addresses with &FFs — a simple
process which takes about 1.2 milli¬
seconds. Then all the pulses are started
and the table is filled with a list of
exceptions. For example, if motor 0
(connected to data bit 0 on the output
port) is to receive a pulse which stops
after a timing count of 128, then the
128th byte of the above table is loaded
with &FE (bit zero is zero) which
replaces &FF. Likewise if motor 1 had to
be turned off after a count of 10 then the
10th byte of the table would be loaded
with &FD (bit one is zero). Next a short
wait before the timing loop itself. The
timing loop starts with the accumulator
set to &FF (all bits on). This is ANDed
with each byte of the table in turn and
output.
In the example above the first
nine bytes of the table contain &FF
and since &FF(accumulator) AND
&FF(table) is &FF, nothing happens.
However, when the 10th byte is encou n-
tered the operation is &FF AND &FD
yielding &FD which turns off the pulse
going to motor 1. The next byte of the
table contains &FF but since the accu¬
mulator now contains &FD, &FD AND
&FF yields &FD again and motor 1
remains off. This continues until it
reaches the 128th element of the table
at which point the operation is &FD
AND &FE yielding &FC which leaves
motor 1 off and also turns off motor 0.
Thus by ANDing the table elements in
turn, the motors can be progressively
turned off without having to time each
one separately. (Note that the excep¬
tions were also loaded intothetable by
ANDing in case two pulses had to be
turned off simultaneously.)
The Basic progam checks the
keyboard to see which motor is to be
adjustedthen POKEsthe newvalue into
the appropriate angle (motor 0 is
controlled by angle, motor 1 by mem¬
ory cell angle+1, and so on).
Since the whole eight motor Event
handling routine only lasts about 21/2-3
milliseconds in every 20 milliseconds
the interruptions slow Basic programs
down by about 12-5%.
Since this is hardly noticeable under
most circumstances the computer
appears to run the Basic program
and the Event handler program at
Listing 2
the same time.
Conclusion
All kinds of programs can be pro¬
duced to command motors to move.
To control an ordinary low voltage
(less than 12 volts) DC motor a relay is
required. The most obvious one to use
is the tape recorder controlling relay.
Just connect pins 1 and 7 (see page 499
of the User Guide) of the cassette
recorder socket in series with your
motor and battery and you can switch
the motor on and off.
Using
A%=&89
X%=0 :REM turns motor off
CALL &FFF4 : REM osbyte call
X%=1 :REM turns motor on
CALL &FFF4
you should be able to hear the relay
clicking.
To control more than one ordinary
small DC motor the user port can be
used but this time rather more simply
than with servo-motors. Not enough
current can be drawn from the port to
drive (as opposed to control) a motor
directly so a buffer and power supply
must be inserted between the data pin
and its corresponding motor.
A convenient chip is a ULN2803A
(R.S.303-422) which contains eight in¬
dependent Darlington drivers. These
behave rather like switches and are
connected in series with the motor and
its power supply; five volts on an input
pin switch it on while 0 volts input
switches the circuit off. Each driver can
be controlled directly by the user port
data pin and will switch up to 500
milliamps at five volts (absolute max¬
imum of 2.5 watt motors).
Connect a five volt supply voltage to
the supply pin (10) and ground to pin 9,
and each data output pin to the
appropriate Darlington input pin; for
example, input 1 is pin 1 and its output
pin 18, input 2 pin 2 output pin 17. The
motor is connected between the five
volt supply and the appropriate Darl¬
ington output pin. When the input is
high (five volts) its output is shorted to
ground switching on the motor, but
when it is low (0 volts) the output pin
voltage becomes the same as the
supply voltage and the motor is switch¬
ed off. No other power supplies or
components are needed.
Just imagine: this could be the way to
start a family of robots. Think of the
possibilities. Could you produce a robot
that BREAKs its own controlling
program? RTTH
142 PCW
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usen^equirements anddori 'tcostan arm anda^ /eg.
Alphacom 81 vs
use as it gets very hot. (I must stress that
I had no problems with it but feel it
would be advisable to keep it cool.)
Dean Electronics, the company be¬
hind the Alphacom, claims that it is a
high speedthermal printer operating at
100 characters per second. This is true
except that it only prints 80 characters
I to a line and the resulting paper feed
slows it down to a speed which is much
nearer 80cps.
Butthermal printers have their short¬
comings: they need special paper and
print quality is usually poor. Special
paper is required as the printer forms
I letters by burning the relevant dot
Sooner or later every home user
considers buying a printer. However,
until recently, the choice has been
between buying a low cost ZX style
printer or paying more than twice the
cost of your micro fora better one. Both
the Alphacom 81 and the Brother HR-5
fall neatly between the two stools and
offer a reasonable 80 columns of
printing at around £150.
Alphacom 81
The Alphacom 81 is the cheaper of the
two machines and is aimed squarely at
the home user. But if your micro isn't on
the list of available interfaces then you
won't be able to use it. At the time of
writing the list includes Commodore
64/VIC 20, BBC B, Dragon, Atari and a
more general RS232 (for the Spectrum
and NewBrain among others). Conse¬
quently few users will be excluded, but
if you have two micros then you'll have
to buy a second interface (the first one is
included in the price).
This dependence on a machine-
specific interface has both advantages
and disadvantages. For example, the
user of the printer has all the instruc¬
tions he needs for his machine and no
more, whereas shops will have to stock
the printer and all available interfaces.
Physically the Alphacom 81 printer is
uninspiring — design is merely func¬
tional. The cream casing houses the
paper roll and the printer mechanism
and nothing more. Its only features are
On/Advance and Off switches and a
hole at the back for the interface
cartridge.
The On/Advance switch is the only
problem in an otherwise faultless prin¬
ter. The first press of this switch turns
the printer on with subsequent ones
advancing the paper. Unfortunately,
nothing indicates that the machine is on
which is rather irritating and could
present a few problems. I would advise
users to turn the printer off when not in
144 pc w
pattern onto the paper's coating. Con¬
sequently, the dots have 'fuzzy' edges
and letters lack definition. Although the
result is readable it doesn't reproduce
well (PCW doesn't accept program
listings on this or any other type of
thermal paper). Such a printout is also
not good enough for word processing.
Looking at all these shortcomings,
one might wonder what the Alphacom
can be used for and why it is better than
cheaper thermal printers?
Well, the main drawback with cheap¬
er thermals — and hence the Alpha-
corn's advantage — is paper width. The
Alphacom's 80 columns are clearer,
easier to read and print a lot faster than
32-40 column widths.
I tested the Alphacom 81 with a
Commodore 64 and found it particular¬
ly useful for development listings and
hard copies, such as adventure game
reports. I was particularly impressed
with its recording of my feeble attempts
to solve the problems of Infocom's
Sorcerer as it printed everything that
appeared on the screen without slow¬
ing the game down.
As mentioned above the printer
comes with a special interface for your
particular machine. You also receive a
general and an interface manual: the
latter includes details and examples of
the commands you will need to make
the most of the printer. These com¬
mands enable you to print both ASCII
and graphics characters which can be
either upper or lower case and format¬
ted into pages. Also print can be
underlined, reversed or elongated
(each character reaching double
width).
Finally, the printer can be placed into
graphics mode. This is where each bit of
a pixel is represented by a dot on the
printer and characters are closed up
allowing the printer to be used for
graphics or screendumps.
Brother HR-5
Flexibility is the key to the Brother HR-5
which is the youngest, smallest and
cheapest of the Brother printers. De¬
scribed as a 'thermal transfer printer' it
has a curious mechanism.
As with the Alphacom, letters are
burned onto the paper, only in thiscase
the Brother burns them from a ribbon
passing in front of a normal thermal
printer head. The ribbon is enclosed in a
cassette and is easy to install and
remove. This process is slower than
conventional thermal techniques but
the print is darker and better defined.
Although the quoted printing speed is
30cps (it takes about 2.5 seconds to
print a line of 80 characters), it winds on
the ribbon at the end of every line which
effectively halves the real printing
speed.
Afurther advantage of this system is
that it uses betterquality paper. For best
results it's advisable to use glossy or
shiny paper which is available in either
a roll or standard sheets. This is a
definite plus over the Alphacom 81 as
thistype of paper ischeaperto buy and
A4 sheets are easier to store.
But if speed is more important and
normal thermal quality will do, then
simply remove the ribbon and insert a
roll of thermal paper.
The Brother printer can be powered
either by four SPII batteries or from the
main power supply. (Batteries have a
limited life and the review set expired
after several days as the paper ran out
with thecassette ribbon notfar behind.)
The Brother is nicely styled in a lighter
cream casing than the Alphacom 81's
and is pleasant to look at. Smaller and
weighing less than the Alphacom it
features online and line feed switches
on its front panel, together with an
alarm light accompanied by a bell
wheneverthe paper or ribbon runs out.
The On/Off switch istucked neatly tothe
left-hand side and the back edge is just
big enough to house the Centronics and
optional RS232 interfaces. The Centro¬
nics interface gives Dragon and BBC
compatibility, and others at a cost.
A choice of standard interfaces will
please many, but certainly not home
users whose machines lack a Centro¬
nics interface. Adding a compatible
interface can cost up to £40. (This, on
top of the £10 price difference, would
make the Alphacom 81 a better choice
for home users.)
The Brother will no doubt find its
home in a briefcase alongside one of
the many portable computers. Such
applications would make best use of its
features: lightness, standard interface
and battery power.
Prices
Alphacom81 printer-!-one
£
interface + one roll of paper
149.95
Tworollsofpaper
5.50
Brother HR-5 printer -1- one roll
of
plain paper + two cassette
ribbons
159.95
Mains power adaptor
14.75
Ribbon cassette
2.45
Paper—Thermal (per roll)
4.75
Paper—Plain (per roll)
2.60
Conclusion
When I began writing this review I
thought that these two printers might
mark the merging of two computer
markets. But I was wrong.
The Alphacom isthe latest in a line of
printers which started with the 32-
column Alphacom 32 and the Brother
HR-5 has descended from a series of
bigger 'brothers' — so the gulf still has
to be bridged. The Alphacom's place is
definitely in the home whereas the
Brother is for people on the move.
Brother HR-5
PCW 145
Painting by
numbers
Iji tjie last three years Psion has workedclosely with Smclajrtq
producesoftwaref^ritscnachine^ MikeLiardettakesa lookat
Abacus andEase[, two ofthe fourprogramsbundjedin with QL,
andnowbieingenhzw
Although Psion has concentrated
mainly on the lucrative games market
with such delights as a flight simulator,
scrabble and chess, it has not entirely
ignored the more serious Spectrum
user. Both spreadsheet and database
software figure in Psion's Spectrum
catalogue in the form of Vu-calc (re¬
viewed in PCW, September 83) and
Vu-file. Evidently Sinclair must have
been highly impressed with Psion —
nearly two years ago it was awarded the
enviable task of implementing the
'bundled' software for the new QL.
Psion's contribution to the QL
amounts to four packages covering the
four commonest applications for a
personal computer — database, word
processing, spreadsheet and graphics.
We'll examine Abacus (spreadsheet)
and Easel (graphics) here.
Although the QL is priced at the level
of a games machine, Psion's software is
eminently comparable to that available
on machines costing five to ten times
the price of a QL. The development of
this software has been a major new
venture for Psion; it has taken a team of
highly-skilled programmers (working
on a mainframe VAX) over 18 months to
produce. Nowthatthe project has been
completed, Psion will not confine its
activities to the QL. It is planning, in
mid-July, to release all the packages in
PC and MS-DOS versions, so owners
of machines like the IBM PC and ACT
Apricot will also get the benefit of
Psion's labours.
At the time of this review QLs were in
extremely short supply, so Psion in¬
vited me to spend the day evaluating
the software on its own in-house QLs. I
was also given a pre-release version of
Abacus for the Apricot. Although Psion
was at great pains to emphasise that the
Apricot version was not fully com¬
pleted and debugged, it stood up very
well to my machinations and demon¬
strated: (a) that Psion really is quite
close to releasing an MS-DOS version;
and (b) itwill be close to the QL version.
Abacus
Like the other packages on the QL,
Abacus is provided on a single micro¬
drive cartridge. These cartridges are
not much largerthan a fifty pence piece,
contain about eight feet of tape in a
continuous loop, and have the storage
capacity of a low-density floppy disk
(about 100k). The software is loaded by
switching the machine on, inserting the
cartridge in the microdrive and typing
"I run mdvl boot'. This rather cryptic
command is needed because current
versions ofthe QL do not automatically
boot from a cartridge but need to be
'told'to do so. The time taken to load the
software is not significantly different
from the time taken to load software
from a floppy disk.
When the software is first loaded a
copyright screen appears, followed by
the main working display (Fig 1). The QL
has three text display modes: 40, 64 or
80 characters per row. Abacus can
operate in any of these modes: in fact, it
has a facility for changing between
different display modes in mid-session.
Most users prefer 80-character width
but if the QL is displaying through a
poor-quality TV, it may be necessary to
work in 64 or even 40-character mode.
Naturally, in 40-character mode, less
information can be displayed and some
of the prompts are more terse, but the
software is functionally unchanged.
The principal working display is
neatly divided into three areas. The top
four lines ofthe screen are reserved for
'prompts' with the main spreadsheet
display below (empty to start with), and
an input line and status information
immediately below that. All four pack¬
ages use the same general screen
arrangement which greatly eases the
overall learning effort. They also all
make use of the QL's colour display
capabilities, using four different col¬
ours for most displays.
The Abacus spreadsheet is orga¬
nised in a fairly standard way. The sheet
has 64 columns, labelled A to Z, AA to
BL; and 255 rows, labelled 1 to 255. With
the QL in 80-character mode and with
standard width columns, the main
display can accommodate a rectangle
of seven columns by 16 rows. One cell
on the display is always highlighted —
this is the 'cursor', or action point. Any
formulae, labels or numbers that may
be typed are assumed to belong to that
particular cell and the results are
displayed there accordingly. This ac¬
tion point can be moved one cell up,
down, left or right by pressing the
appropriate arrow key.
Attempts to move the cursor off¬
screen are dealt with in two different
ways: if the arrow key is pressed and
released, the screen is redrawn shifted
one row or column along, to accommo¬
date the destination cell, and the cursor
is displayed in that cell. If the arrow key
is held down or pressed very rapidly,
there is not enough time to redraw the
whole screen before the next character
is transmitted so only the column or
row headings are changed. Once the
key is finally released the display is
redrawn correctly. Although this
146 PCW
sounds complicated it actually enables
very rapid moves across the spread¬
sheet with no delays for displaying
intermediate areas that you are not
interested in.
The operation of Abacus is controlled
by specially assigned single key¬
strokes. As far as possible, Psion has
standardised on the use of these special
keys across all four packages. The QL
has five function keys labelled FI to F5.
It also has arrow keys and an ESCAPE
key, and these operate in the same way
for all the software.
The arrow keys move the cursor
action point(their use is fairly obvious
in spreadsheeting and word proces¬
sing).
The ESCAPE key causesthecurrently
selected operation to be abandoned.
Unfortunately, if this is used following a
sequence of selections and sub¬
selections of commands it does not just
'undo' the most recent choice, but
everything right back to the beginning.
Following an escape keystroke, a multi¬
ple command sequence must be re¬
entered from scratch.
The function key FI is used for 'help'.
Press this key at any time, even in the
middle of entering a formula, and
help information relevant to the cur¬
rent context is displayed. In order to
conserve usage of RAM, the help
information is stored on the microdrive
cartridge, so it's advisable to leave the
cartridge in place throughout the op¬
eration of the system. The QL has two
microdrives, so this is no great dis¬
advantage — the other is always
available for loading and saving data,
and so on.
Function key F2 enlarges the main
display area to overwrite the prompts at
the top. In Abacus, this increases the
spreadsheet display capability from 16
rows to 20. Pressing F2 a second time
restores the prompts display.
F3 selects 'command mode'. Abacus
has 18 commands, such as 'Copy',
'Save' and 'Quit', which are all displayed
in the prompt area after F3 is pressed. A
command is then selected by pressing
its initial letter. As there are only 26
letters in the alphabet some of the
commands have slightly obscure
names: 'echo' is used for 'replicating'
formulae, but is not called 'copy' or
'replicate' because 'c' and 'r' are already
in use for other commands.
F4 is used when the main spread¬
sheet display is split into two windows
('windowing' is one of the 18 com¬
mands). F4 jumps the cursor from one
window to the other.
F5 is used for 'jumping' the cursor.
After pressing F5 the destination cell
coordinates can be entered, for exam¬
ple A1 or BG250, and the cursor is
moved there directly with a redraw of
the screen if necessary.
Modelling
As with most spreadsheet systems, the
raw input for Abacus models consists
of numbers, text and formulae. Num¬
bers are simply keyed in and are
entered intothecurrentcursorcell once
the ENTER key is pressed. Text is
treated in a similar manner, except that
it must be pre-announced by using the
quotation character keystroke. If this is
omitted, Abacus assumes you are
entering an erroneous formula.
Formulae perform the spreadsheet
calculations and are built out of refer¬
ences to other cells, constants and
arithmetic operations. For example, the
formula A1 -l-10 * B2 would produce the
result 110 if cell A1 contained 100 and
B2 contained 10. The result is displayed
instantly, as soon as the formula entry
is completed. If A1 or B2 are altered for
any reason, this formula and any other
that references them would automati¬
cally be recalculated. This is fairly
standard spreadsheeting but Abacus
also has some additional unique for¬
mulae facilities:
'row =': if a formula is preceded by 'row
=', it will automatically be replicated
across the row currently occupied by
the cursor. Before doing the replication,
Abacus prompts for the range of
columns to receive the formula, but
because it chooses sensible defaults, it
is normally only necessary to press
ENTER in response. The result of this is
that model building can proceed quick¬
ly and simply, a row at a time rather than
a cell at a time. There is also a 'col ='
facility that performs the same function
on columns.
Row and column names: the first row
and column of a spreadsheet are
normally used for annotation. On a
typical financial spreadsheet, the col¬
umn headings would be month names
and the row headings would be titles for
particular items. These titles can be
used in formulae: for example, if three
of the rows in the spreadsheet are
labelled Sales, Costs and Profits, then
the formula Profits = Sales - Costs can
be entered and the entire Profits row
will be set up accordingly. The cursor
does not need to be in the Profits rowfor
this to happen and the names can be
abbreviated providing they remain
unambiguous. Column calculations
can be specified in like fashion. In order
to do this, Abacus must be able to
distinguish between row and column
names so obviously they must be
unique — scarcely a serious limitation.
However, the facility is limited in one
respect — it only functions as a
short-cut for formula input. Once a
formula has been entered using row or
column headings, it is translated into
the internal format of cell references
and the original formula is lost. Thus
the profitformula above might result in
cell B10 getting the formula B8-B6; CIO
getting C8-C6, and so on, but the
original formula is unrecoverable. This
contrasts with financial planning
spreadsheets where calculations are
both entered and retained in this
row-formula notation. However, finan¬
cial planning software is notoriously
slow compared with pure spreadsheet
software; and Abacus certainly offers
speed of operation even if the row
formulae are not retained as such.
Special functions: Abacus provides a
number of special functions not com¬
monly available in spreadsheets, but
very useful for display designing, and
so on. For example, row = month (col()
— 1) can be used to set up a row
containing the names for the months,
leaving thefirst column blank; the 'row
=' copies the formula right across the
row. It is identical in all columns but in
column B, 'col ()' evaluates to two (the
second column) so the 2-1 th month is
displayed (that is, January). In column
C the third column, the 3-1 th month
(that is, February) is displayed, and so
HELP
CURSOR
DATA & FORMULA
TEXT type"
COMMANDS
I press FI
press
press F3
PROMPTS
GOTO CELL
enter directly
followed by
ESCAPE
press F2
press F5 ,
& press ENTER
text & ENT
press ESC
A
|
L
C D E F
.1 G i
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
S
9;
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
CELL A1 EXTENT A1 A1 MEMORY 12K
EMPTY
Fig 1 Main display (80 characters)
PCW147
on. If more than 12 columns are
required, months are repeated.
Other special functions include 'rept',
'len' and 'width' which can be useful for
underlining and primitive graphing.
For example, if cell A5 contains rept
(" = ",len(A4)), then whatever A4 con¬
tains will be underlined by " = "s. The
"widthO" function could replace "len
(A4)" above and the full cell width of the
column would be filled with " = "s. To
create a bar graph for a column of
numbers starting at Z9 the formula
col = rept ("*",Z9) would suffice, but of
course this produces a very rough
graph. There are far more elegant
graphing facilities available in Easel.
Finally, there are date functions, text
functions, conditionals and a number
of other useful modelling functions —
WARE
code and aims to release another 18k
for the spreadsheet, which should
more than double its storage capacity.
There are also expansion memory
boards in Sinclair's pipeline which
make a huge difference, but in the
meantime QL Abacus on a standard QL
can only accommodate small- to
medium-sized models.
Special commands
Abacus offers 18 different commands.
These are used for global operations on
the entire spreadsheet such as loading
and saving data, printing, and so on.
. .no serious comparisons can be made between
Psion’s software andanythingelse running on a £400
computer. On low-cost hardware the packages are in a
class of their own.’
all in addition to the more mundane
trigonometry, net present value and
other standard functions.
Formula storage: on most spreadsheet
systems, when a formula is copied or
replicated it is copied into each and
every cell. If the formula is lengthy this
can consume a lot of storage and if the
formula is subsequently corrected, the
entire replication process must be
repeated.
Following replication in Abacus (us¬
ing "row =", and so on), the formula is
stored only once and each cell just
refers to it. Abacus automatically ad¬
justs its usage of the formula in
accordance with the position of the cell
referring to it, thus simulating the usual
relative replication. The formula is also
adjusted when it's displayed so this
feature is almost invisible to the user;
this is just as well as it would be al¬
most impossible to use Abacus other¬
wise. This feature only ever manifests
itself in two respects: more efficient use
of storage, so bigger models can be
created; and the omission of the
replication process following a change
to the formula—all cells that referred to
the old formula automatically get the
new one.
Bearing this in mind, Abacus is
promising very large model capacity
for the forthcoming MS-DOS versions
but the QL Benchtested capacity is a
little disappointing. Out of 128k of RAM
in a standard QL, only 80k is available
for applications software and the Aba¬
cus code consumes 68k, so these
results were recorded with just 12k of
RAM for the spreadsheet. Psion is
currently optimising the QL Abacus
The following facilities are offered:
Communications with other Psion
packages: Psion has designed a special
file format that can be used by every
package. Using this 'export' format
data can be written to a file by one
package and read by another. In par¬
ticular, Abacus data can be transferred
to the Easel graphics for drawing
graphs, or to the Quill word processor
for document integration. Spreadsheet
data can also be picked up by the
Archive database should the need
arise.
In many respects, this facility greatly
mitigates the disappointment that the
Psion packages do not run under the
QL's multi-tasking system. Theoretical¬
ly, the QL can support several different
applications all running simultaneous¬
ly and you can switch between them at
the touch of a button. This idea is a
non-starter for the Psion software, as
each package uses up all 128k of RAM
with nothing left for anything else.
However, it's better that the packages
can communicate with one another
than that they can all run simultaneous¬
ly, so in this respect Psion has done the
best it can with the available hardware.
Windowing: the spreadsheet display
can be split in two, either vertically or
horizontally. The display of each half is
then dealt with independently of the
other so that completely different parts
of the spreadsheet can be held
onscreen simultaneously. This facility
is useful for holding important areas of
the spreadsheet (for example, the
bottom line) on display while other
areas are being altered.
Spreadsheet editing: a selection of
commands which can be used for
adding and deleting lines into the
spreadsheet. There is also a command
for amending formulae — this can be
quickerthan retypingfrom scratch ifthe
formula is complex. It also obviates the
need to recopy after the change. If a
copiedformula isamendedall previous
copies are amended simultaneously.
Sorting : a whole column, or a part, can
be sorted using the 'Order' command.
This can deal with a mixture of num¬
bers, formulae and text. Numbers are
arranged in ascending order, before
text which is arranged in alphabetical
order. Only one column is affected by
sorting. Other data in the row is left in
the original position. Unlike Lotus 1-2-3
it's not possible to use sorting for
'records' which extend across several
columns.
Formatting: a variety of different dis¬
play formats can be selected. Numbers
or text can be left-, right- or centre-
justified within a column. Numbers can
be preceded by monetary symbols
such as $ or £ displayed in scientific or
financial notation.
Printing and file operations: there are
commands for saving the spreadsheet
onto a named file on the microdrive
cartridge, loading it back again and
merging files into an existing spread¬
sheet model. Printing can be directed
either at the printer or at a file.
During file operations the perform¬
ance of the microdrives is quite in¬
teresting. The Benchmarks recorded
just eight seconds to load a file but 80
seconds to save it. Evidently, saving
Benchmarks
Maximum number of columns: 64.
Maximum number of rows: 256.
Numeric precision: 14 digits.
Abacus tested on a standard Sinclair QL with 128k RAM.
1 (a) Number of rows of formulae accommodated: 56.
(b and c) Recalculation time: 20secs (2.5 rows per second).
(d) Horizontal scrolling : two columns per second.
(e) Vertical scrolling: 2.5 rows per second.
2 Number of rows of numbers accommodated: 57.
3 Numbers of rows of text accommodated : 58.
4 Time taken to load/save 56-row model on microdrive: eight (load), 80 (save)
seconds.
Benchmark (a) with additional 128k RAM board: 8832 cells (680 'rows').
148 pc w
10
i b
0
n
•Jan Feb Mar Apr
Jun Jul fiuq Sep Oct Hoy Dec
1984
Fig 2 Sample graph produced on an Epson MX-80 printer
data also involves verification with
automatic correction if the verification
fails. Thus saving a file must always
take at least twice as long as loading
and even longer if it fails to verify
immediately.
Documentation
I didn't see the full QL documentation
but a draft of the Abacus section lacking
an index and contents page. This ran to
over 50 pages, liberally illustrated, with
clear instructions on using the soft¬
ware. Iftherestofthedocumentation is
up to this standard and is well indexed
there should be few complaints.
The Abacus software is also very well
documented with 'help' screens. The
help facility is context-sensitive, so
whenever you press the HELP key you
get information pertinent to the activity
you are attempting, with the further
option to explore help for other areas.
Easel
Easel is a completely separate package
from Abacus, on its own cartridge and
with its own documentation. It can be
used independently of all the other
Psion packages but in particular it
complements Abacus very neatly.
Having 'exported' part of an Abacus
spreadsheet, this can be graphed by
exiting Abacus and running Easel. The
recently exported file can then be
imported to Easel where a graph is
displayed instantly. A typical export
from Abacus might include several
rows of the spreadsheet; for example.
Costs, Prices and Profits across all 12
months of a year. All associated in¬
formation, such as the month-name
column headings, can be carried over
by the export file where Easel sorts it to
produce a graph. The graph can be
printed out on a number of different
graphics printers: the plots shown in
Fig 2 were produced on an Epson
MX-80.
Data can also be typed in directly with
Easel. It employs a cursor which dic¬
tates the column in which the entered
data will be graphed. The cursor can be
moved from column to column using
the left-right arrow keys. When a
number is entered it is immediately
plotted in the current column with axes
automatically rescaled if necessary.
Because of this and an intelligent use of
default display options, it's possible to
enter and see a graph in the time it takes
to type the numbers.
Although Easel is billed as a 'busi¬
ness graphics' package it is also cap-
ableof plotting mathematical graphsas
Fig 3 shows. For the technically minded
this is a demonstration of Fourier
Analysis: a plot of five harmonics
summing to produce a square wave.
Prices
Sinclair QL including four Psion pack¬
ages £399. MS-DOS versions (pro¬
jected prices): £175 each, except Arc¬
hive — £275. A substantial discount is
available if all four are purchased.
Conclusion
A common mistake made when com¬
paring software is not to compare like
with like, but I am deliberately going to
do this here. This is because no serious
comparisons can be made between
Psion's software and anything else
running on a £400 computer. On
low-cost hardware the packages are in
a class of their own.
Psion obviously recognises this —
hence the forthcoming MS-DOS and
IBM PC versions. Having seen a pro¬
totype of the MS-DOS Abacus it's clear
that Psion is well down the road with the
spreadsheet software at least. Assum¬
ing all goes well and it meets its
targeted launch date (early Septem¬
ber), Psion will be offering an inte¬
grated suite of word processing, data¬
base, spreadsheet and graphics at
about the time this is published.
If the QL versions are anything to go
by Psion will have a very interesting
offering with a greater range of func¬
tionality than Lotus 1-2-3, which does
not really offer word processing and is
fairly weak as a database. Of course, at
the time of writing the MS-DOS ver¬
sions were not released; Lotus has
launched Symphony and Ashton-Tate
has Framework — to name but two
future rivals for Psion.
The QL version of Abacus, available
today, isfunctionally the equal of many
MS-DOS spreadsheets. The QL Easel is
simply excellent. Add the two other
packages with links between all of them
and a whole Sinclair QL for just £400,
and how can you resist?
For more information contact: Sinc¬
lair on Camberley (0276) 686100 or
Psion on (01) 723 9408. im
PCW149
ES/PAdyisorjsclaimedto be a powerful, cost effective toolforbuilding
expertjsystems on micros Patrick Chang[ puts it to the test and forms
hjs own 'mteljjgent^qnclusions.
The Department of Health and Social
Security(theDHSStoyou,meandthree
million plus others) seems finally to
have come to the conclusion that it can't
understand its own rules. This may not
be news to you, but the interesting thing
is that the DHSS is looking seriously at
using computers with expert system
software as the only way of getting out
of its present embarrassing predica¬
ment.
Expert systems are designed to
absorb complex information and use
the data in an intelligent way to arrive at
the correct conclusion. One of the best
known applications is of a computer
mimicking a hospital consultant by
analysing a patient's symptoms and
providing the correct diagnosis.
Up until recently expert systems had
only been developed on large expen¬
sive mainframe computers. However,
recently, micro versions have become
readily available. ES/P Advisor is one of
this new breed.
Billed as a low-cost, entry-level tool
for those wishing to build prototype or
small-scale expert systems, ES/P Advi¬
sor is available for MS-DOS or PC-DOS
(128k RAM).
ES/P Advisor, implemented in ESL's
Prolog, consists of the Knowledge
Representation Language (KRL), the
KRL compiler and the ES/P consultation
shell (see Fig 1). Knowledge is coded
KRL Compiler -. » Knowledge Base . ■»
Knowledge Source
Fite
4
USER*- .. - .
Fig 1 The ES/P Tool Structure
using the KRL to give a knowledge
source file. This file can then be
submitted to the KRL compiler whose
task is to convert it into a knowledge
base file for the consultation shell. The
ES/P shell provides the front-end and
allows the user to interact with the
compiled knowledge base. Rules must
always be either/or choices — fuzzy
logic is not supported.
The package comes with five show-
them knowledge bases on how to:
(1) conduct one's own conveyancing to
sell a property;
(2) conduct PAYE procedures;
(3) bake bread;
(4) work out an opening bid in contract
bridge; and
(5) decide when Statutory Sick Pay is
due.
These knowledge bases are obvious¬
ly designed to highlight the strength of
ES/P Advisor in clerical and managerial
applications.
Building a prototype
system
In order to test Advisor I chose a
non-trivial domain of application. But
not too non-trivial. After all, the two
classic non-trivial expert systems,
Dendral and Macsyma,eachtookabout
38 man years to build. My aim was to
construct a system for advising how to
select visual aids and media facilities
forteaching and learning purposes in a
large educational institution. Hence,
the acronym MEG, for MEdia-Guide.
MEG consists of rules and, depend¬
ing on what answers it receives, pro¬
poses various suggestions.
The institution I selected was the
Polytechnic of Wales. Over 60% of the
information needed for the knowledge
base can be found in the Institution's
Media Unit handbook. Additional in¬
formation was acquired by asking
members of the Media Unit and culled
from personal experience with the unit.
In consultation, the system begins by
asking the user about conditions con¬
cerning the session for which advice on
visual and media aids is being sought.
For example, will the lecturer be pre¬
sent? Is the session largely used for
practical work or theoretical studies?
Would visual aids enhance the learning
process? And so on.
Given the domain and the readily
available information, prototyping the
system took place rapidly. Within a
night, a skeletal system was running on
the IBM PC. By the second night, the
main parts of the prototype system
were fully coded. After a third night
spent massaging or rubbing out jumpy
features, the prototype system was
completed. But like all prototype expert
systems, MEG needs to be refined
before it can be used with confidence.
The KRL syntax used for coding the
knowledge is simple and neat. The
structure of the knowledge source file
consists of a header, a title and sections
(see Fig 2).
1 Header
2 Title
3 Sections
Fig 2 The Knowledge Source File
The header is used to identify the
knowledge source file. This is followed
by a title preceded by the word title.
For example:
title 'A Guide for Visual Aids and Media
Facilities.'
After the header and title, the rest of
the knowledge source consists of sec¬
tions. Sections are made up of para¬
graphs, parameters and references.
Paragraphs consist of text which are
displayed when activated. References
are like GOTO statements: they tell the
compiler to jump to another section to
continue processing from there. As in
reading Prolog clauses, the compiler
reads the section from top to bottom.
Conditions can be strung together to
give complex logical relationships in¬
volving parameter and constant values
enclosed in braces.
For example:
{va helpful > 4 and
lecturer_choice=extracts}
reference suggestion-10.
Where the conditions are: if the
parameter va_helpful (va for visual
150PCW
aids) has a rating of greater than 4 and
the lecturer wishes to use extracts from
books, then examine the advice in the
section named suggestion_10. As
shown in Fig 2, parameters can be facts,
numbers, categories or phrases.
For instance:
reaLlife-sitn: 'there is a need to
analyse a real life situation'
fact
askable
'Will the learning process require' &
students to'
'analyse a real life situation?'
The keyword askable forces the
question to be displayed when the
parameter is first activated. Facts are
either true or false. Numbers can be
integers or reals. A negative number
must be in decimal form — hence -10
should be written as -10.0. Phrasesare
used to store strings of words; for
example, for names and addresses.
Categories consist of specified lists of
options.
Once invoked, the compiler displays
a menu consisting of a list of the sources
it already knows and a prompt at the
bottom of the screen for a source file to
be submitted. (The 40k prototype MEG
knowledge source took seven minutes
to compile).
The compiler converts the near-
English representation of the KRL into
Prolog clausesfortheES/P shell. Hence,
the compiler and the shell perform the
work of an inference engine. Compila¬
tion options include:
list, to request a listing summary file;
print, to direct a summary to the printer;
nocheck, for logic gurus to sidestep the
consistency check; and,
return, for the defaults.
When errors are detected, messages
are displayed by the compiler and
processing is suspended until the user
instructs the compiler to continue.
Sometimes the compiler's pointer to a
mistake's location is not spot on. One
may get some surprising error mes¬
sages when the disk is full. ESL stressed
that one does not need to know Prolog
to use the tool. In general, this is true.
At the end of the compilation, a
statistical summary of the source file is
displayed (see screenshot 1). If the
compilation is a success, an executable,
knowledge base file iscreated.Thiscan
now be submitted to the ES/P shell for
the consultation proper to begin.
The ES/P shell is the most attractive
(1) Statistical summary of source file
component of the tool to look at. The
front-end is friendly, professionally
packaged and very pleasant to use.
When the shell is invoked by typing
ESP, a menu of knowledge bases is
displayedandthesystem promptsfora
selection (see screenshot 2). Colour and
screen handling facilities are utilised to
give yellow lettering on black and
reverse outon bandsof blue.The name
of the section under examination is
displayed on the top centre of the
screen window. When a parameter is
activated, its name is displayed on the
top left corner as the current goal to be
investigated. When a paragraph is
activated, its text will be displayed in the
middle of the window.
The shell expects a knowledge base
file. If an uncompiled source file is
offered, the shell will try to read it,
complain about the syntax and dump
you back into the operating system.
When a valid file is specified, the
introductory paragraph is displayed to
advertise the aims of the knowledge
base and the consultation show begins.
When a parameter is first encountered
either in a condition or when its value is
needed but not yet established, the
system proceeds to induce the value
from a rule or by asking the user.
For example, with the following
conditions
{not lecturer-talking and not
avaLto-consult and
actions-required}
reference suggestion-6.
The system will try to establish each
parameter in a process known as
backward chaining : that is, reasoning
backward. If any of these parameters
needs the value of another which has
not been established, the required
parameter is immediately investigated
to obtain its value. Hence, in order <o
establish that suggestion_6 is relevant,
it needsto collectthe right evidence, by
establishing that the lecturer is not
talking — that is, not giving a lecture;
that he is not available for consultation
and that practical actions are required
for the learning process. If any of the
parameters fail to meet the condition,
then section 'suggestion_6' is rejected
and processing continues with the next
statement in sequence. The consulta¬
tion ends when a final advisory text is
output which is marked by the keyword
quit in the knowledge source file.
The shell supports a list of commands
(2) The system prompts for a selection
(see screenshot 3) which can be re¬
quested by typing help or ? These
include:
val X — to force the system to obtain the
value parameter X immediately;
status —to display the current values of
all parameters,
print;
recap; and,
trace.
Other commands include explain, how
X and why N. These three commands
are, of course, very important as an
expert system worthy ofthe name must
be able to report what it is up to.
Documentation
The ES/P manual is slim, well-written
and well-illustrated by short examples,
butthetutorial,though adequate, is not
comprehensive. Some facilities de¬
served further explanation: in particu¬
lar, how numbers are computed, how
conditions are examined by backward
chaining, and how sections are refer¬
enced by forward chaining.
One very important feature is the
claim that ES/P Advisor can be inter¬
faced with a Prolog interpreter to allow
Prolog clauses to be embedded in the
KRL source files. The manual does not
demonstrate how this can be done.
Conclusion
ES/P Advisor is a viable entry-level,
cost-effective tool which offers clerical
and managerial workers an opportun¬
ity to examine the relevance of expert
systems in their respective areas of
work.
Although it is specifically designed
for text animation, it could also be used
to construct an expert system based on
the knowledge of an expert, rather than
that contained in a manual orrulebook,
or for interests such as gardening,
cookery, repair guides and so on.
ES/P Advisor is not designed to
support fuzzy or uncertain deduction,
and despite the fact that it is specially
designed for text animation, its range of
application is wide given the wealth of
knowledge available in the printed
form. At £600, the ES/P package is an
excellent entry point into the expert
system field.
Further information on ES/P Advisor
(price €600 incl VAT) is available from
Expert Systems Limited on (0865)
242206. irrn
(3) List ofcommands
PCW151
Dimension 68000
A mach[n(3 with tjTecapabilrtyto emujate the IBM PC, Apple Hand
K^yprojTvcroswguldsee^m to be a practical proposition. Butitmight
alsoprove to be an expensive mistake. Peter Brighttakesa lookatthe
'multi-faceted' Dimension 68000.
152 PC W
It had to happen. First we had the
unfriendly micro, then we had the
friendly micro, now meet the world's
first schizophrenic micro. As well as
being itself, the Dimension 68000 thinks
it's an Apple II, an IBM PC and a Kaypro
portable.
This isthefirst micro in the UK which
can emulate more than one other
machine at the flick of a switch. It is
achieved by clever use of both hard¬
ware and software. The basic Dimen¬
sion uses a Motorola 68000 processor
with up to 512k of RAM on the main
board. When you upgrade your
machine there is no longer any need to
throw away your software and start
again — simply add a more powerful
processor for the more difficult jobs.
Hardware
The Dimension conforms to the tradi¬
tional three-box design: main unit,
keyboard and^display. The main unit is
metal-cased, so there shouldn't be any
radio frequency problems, and it looks
very traditional — finished in cream
with a black blanking plate at the front
next to the disk drives.
Thefrontofthemain unithousestwin
half-height 5V4in floppy disk drives and
the reset switch. The switch signal can
be intercepted under software control,
so you can stop inquisitive fingers from
blowing the system.
The rear panel houses an RS232
serial port, a Centronics printer port, a
games paddle port, the composite
video output and the keyboard socket.
In addition there are six blanked off
slots which can be removed if you wish
to install expansion cards. The back
panel also houses the ducting for the
relatively quiet internal cooling fan.
The overall impression of the con¬
struction is one of solid dependability.
Ease of servicing is good — to get
inside the main unit simply slacken six
screws and remove the lid.
The main board sits at the bottom of
the unit and takes up most of the
available space. The build quality was
good with no obvious signs of patching.
A major part of the board on the review
machine was taken up by RAM chips —
up to four banks of 17,64k chips gives a
total onboard capacity of 512k. If you
need more memory you will have to
plug it into the expansion ports. The
machine also comes with 8k of ROM
which is used to hold the bootstrap
loader, some basic diagnostics and the
ROMBIOS routines for the operating
system.
From the outset the Dimension was
designed to be based on a bus system,
allowing extra boards to be plugged in.
Micro Craft, the US-based manufactur¬
er, seems to be very eager that third
party manufacturers should produce
add-on cards for the machine. This
eagerness extends to providing a sys¬
tem builder'stoolkitand offering finan¬
cial incentives.
The main board houses six slots for
expansion cards. On the review
machine three of these were occupied
by 6512 (a 6502 with an external clock),
Z80 and 8086 slave emulation proces¬
sors (see 'Emulation' section). You can
also add RAM cards, RS232 cards, and
so on.
Themain processorintheDimension
is the Motorola MC68000 CPU. This
truly massive chip sits on the far
right-hand side of the main board; and
is powerful enough to allow the
machine to be a practical proposition if
you add more serial cards and a
multi-user operation system. Unfortu¬
nately time did not allow me to try it out
as a multi-user system.
Although the review machine was
supplied with twin 5V4in, 40-track flop¬
py disk drives, the casing has space for
two more or for a hard disk.
The disks and their associated con¬
troller (a NEC 765) are highly pro¬
grammable to allow them to read the
different disk formats necessary for
Apple, IBM and CP/M-80 emulation.
They are capable of half stepping and so
can read most protected Apple disks. In
fact, when the machine is running
under Apple emulation the drives even
sound like Apple disks!
Even if you are not running emula¬
tion, you can still persuade the disks to
read alien formats by using the FOR¬
MAT utility supplied with the machine
under CP/M-68k. This utility allows you
to read IBM PC single and double-sided
CP/M, Tandy TRS-80, Kaypro,
Cromemco SD and Osborne SD. I tried
this out on some Kaypro CP/M-80 disks
and it seemed to work fine.
The Dimension comes with a compo¬
site video output as standard, so you
should be able to plug most popular
monitors into the machine with no
problem — as long as they support
composite video. The review machine
was supplied with a Taxan amber
monitor which was fine. (Asa matter of
taste I still prefer green screens to
amber.)
The default display on the Dimension
is 80 columns x 25 lines. The 25th line is
usually used to display system status.
When you first boot CP/M it shows the
disk formats that your floppy drives are
set to read, and how much RAM is
available.
The most interesting aspect of the
Dimension's display is that its size can
Average IBM PC clone keyboard, although the Caps Lock and NUM Lock keys with built-in LEDS areinnovative
PCW153
At the rear of the machine six presently blanked-off slots will allow the installation of expansion cards
be altered under software
control. In addition to the
standard 80 x 25, the system
comes with utilitiestocreate80 x 50,20
x 20, 40 x 24 and 100 x 25 displays.
Some of these configurations look very
strange — 80 x 50 was virtually
unreadable on the Taxan monitor
because it was flickering so much. It is
possible that a more expensive monitor
wouldn't have this problem. The
keyboard is a straight copy of the one on
the IBM PC; but whereas the PC has one
of the best keyboards available, this
copy is merely average. Whoever
manufactures it must be making a mint
because this copy seems to be used by
virtually every PC lookalike I have seen.
The keyboard is connected to the
main unit via a coiled cable and a DIN
plug. There's not quite as much cable to
play with as on some other systems as it
has to plug into the back of the machine.
The keys are divided into three
functional areas: 10 function keys on
the left; followed by the qwerty typing
area; and the numeric keypad/cursor
control area on the right. The only
improvement over the standard IBM
keyboard isthatthe Caps Lock and Num
Lock keys have built-in LEDs which
make it easy to see if they are engaged.
The keys don't have the solid feel of
the IBM. However, they do have the
advantage of having lumps moulded
onto the'F'/J'and numeric'5' keys. I'm
told these make it easier to position
your fingers if you are a touch-typist.
I'm not a touch-typist so they made no
difference in my case.
One final point about the keyboard is
that the review machine came with an
American keyboard with no '£' sign. It's
a small point but very annoying.
System software
The Dimension supports a wide range
of operating systems. In single-user
The main unit houses twin half-height5V4in floppy diskdrives
mode it uses CP/M-68k; however, in
multi-user mode it supports the less
well-known Mirage, with Unix and Bos
being ported onto the machine at the
moment.
Mention CP/M-68k to anyone who
knows about micro-operating systems,
and the response is likely to be either
'What?' or 'Isn't that the DIY kit?'
CP/M-68k is the Motorola 68000
version of CP/M. It was written in the
early days of Digital Research deciding
to put CP/M on every microprocessor it
could lay its hands on. It has been the
poor relation of the CP/M family for a
long time — the attitude from Digital
Research seems to have been 'Here's a
C complier, here are some routines ...
get on with it.'
The majority of 68000 implementa¬
tions have been in powerful multi-user
'super micros' where single-user CP/M
is not appropriate. Consequently very
little applications software has been
ported onto this processor/operating
system.
This may change soon — I know of at
least one company which is taking
advantage of the apparent mess which
Sinclair has made of QDOS by porting
CP/M-68k onto the QL. This one
machine has the potential to sell in high
enough numbers to justify indepen¬
dent software vendors moving their
154PCW
software onto CP/M-68k.
CP/M-68konthe Dimension seemsto
work well enough. It feels more like the
old CP/M 2.2 than newer versions such
as 3.1. It still has STAT which was
dropped on 3.1 and it doesn't have SDIR
or any of the fancy new CP/M features.
The first thing you notice about this
version of CP/M is that it is relocatable
and has to be relocated depending on
how much RAM you have. Micro Craft
has provided four submit files to make
the process easier. These are called
SYS128, SYS256, SYS384 and SYS512.
The Dimension version of CP/M-68k
does have a couple of nice touches
which are worthy of note. The first is the
addition of a RAMDISK utility. This
allows you to set aside a portion of RAM
as a silicon disk. This is accessed as
drive K: by CP/M-68k and provides an
easy way of speeding up applications,
especially those that rely on overlays.
RAMDISK 256 sets aside a 256k block of
RAM, RAMDISK 0 switches the
RAMDISK off.
The second feature is a print spooler.
This intercepts text going to the printer
and writes it to an area of RAM where it
is held until the printer can print it. This
saves you having to wait for the printer
and means that you can get on with
something else while the printer is still
printing.
RAM is allocated to the spooler with
the SPOOL command. The syntax is
exactly the same as the RAMDISK
command; for example, SPOOL 64
would set aside 64k of RAM for the
spooler.
The review machine was also sup¬
plied with the Mirage multi-user operat¬
ing system.
The major claim to fame of the
Dimension is that it can run programs
that weren't originally designed to run
on it. At the moment it can emulate the
IBM PC,theApplellandthell-l- (butnot
yet the lie or the lie), and a range of
CP/M-80 2.2 machines including the
Kaypro which I tested here. In theory
there is no reason why someone
shouldn't write hisown emulator given
the time and experience.
When the machine first arrived I was
very curious to see how Micro Craft had
managed to convince a machine with a
dirty great 68000 processor in it that it
was really an Apple II or an IBM PC or a
Kaypro, all of which use different
processors and have different
architectures to the Dimension.
When I tookthe lid off all was revealed
— there sitting in the expansion slots
were a 6512(Apple), an 8086(1 BM) and a
Z80(Kaypro etal).
When, say, an IBM program is
loaded, the instructions are executed
not by the 68000 but by the 8086. This is
fine until the program decides it wants
to talk to the outside world and finds
that memory addresses, disks, display
and keyboard aren't where expected.
This problem is overcome by a
combination of hardware and software.
All the device controllers are highly
programmable and so can be program¬
med to different settings. Also the
68000 handles all the I/O along the bus
so that it is possible to program the
68000 and the device controllers to
imitate the hardware of the target
machine and fool the application prog¬
ram into thinking that the Dimension is
really an Apple or an IBM.
This is no mean feat when you
consider that Micro Craft wouldn't have
had access to the source code for any of
the systems. Also, because the emula¬
tion programs are written in 68000
code, Micro Craft neatly sidesteps any
danger of the likes of IBM suing it’for
ripping off the code in the IBM ROM.
IBM emulation: The review system
came complete with no less than four
different IBM emulation programs:
IBM, IBMGRF40, IBMMONO and
IBMEXP18. The first three emulate 80 x
25 colour graphics, 40 x 25 colour
graphiesand monochrometext respec¬
tively. IBMEXP18 was an experimental
enhanced version of the emulation
which atthetimeofwriting hadn't been
fully debugged.
Assumingthatyourprogram issetup
to run on a colour graphics IBM, you can
call up the emulation program by
simply typing 'IBM'. This pulls in the
emulation program which is about 22k
long andthen displaysa sign-on screen
telling you what your system configura¬
tion is, and asking you to put an IBM
boot disk in drive A.
It is possible to alter the default
system configuration by specifying
parameters when you call the IBM
program. For example, the default
system for the review machine was:
412k of RAM, an 80 x 25 graphics
display adaptor, two double-sided disk
drives, one parallel prrnter interface
and one serial interface card.
If for some reason I had decided that I
only wanted 256k of RAM to be
allocated to the PC emulation I could
have typed 'IBM MEM = 256'.
The second main parameter is 'IN¬
TENSITY'. If the applications program
uses different display intensities then
they will be displayed by the emulator
as reverse video. None of my test
programs needed this but I have a
feeling it could look a little strange.
For people 'in the know' the
'CONFIG=$$$$' parametercan be used
to specify exact hardware emulation
andisthesoftwareequivalentoftheDIP
switches on the main board of the PC.
The only trouble is that the argument
for CONFIG is a two-byte hex word
which is worked out by referring to a
table in the reference manual. I have a
feeling that most people will stick with
the default settings!
Micro Craft claims about 80-90%
compatibility with the IBM PC for its
emulation. I think this is about right. I
tried Microsoft's Flight Simulator on
the system and it booted up quite
happily. The only problem was that it
didn't work correctly. Although the
display was fine and the instrumenta¬
tion responded to keyboard input, I
couldn't make the thing fly. At first I put
this down to pilot incompetence, but
then I tried the same disk on my Olivetti
and I flew it with no problems.
I can only conclude that there was a
small bug in my version of the emula¬
tion software. It did all the difficult
things (video and keyboard scanning)
fine, but fell down on other points.
Micro Craft shows a refreshing hon¬
esty about compatibility problems.
Included in the emulation disk was a
README file which listed all the known
problems with the emulation software.
These included direct I/O to the NEC 765
disk controller, games port not emu¬
lated, specker channel 2 not emulated
and BASICA won't run becausethe IBM
ROM is copyright IBM.
The experimental release 1.18 which
was included is said to support direct
I/O to the NEC 765 and have improved
support for the RS232 port (although it
is still not fully supported).
To exit emulation mode you can
either use the time-honoured CTRL ALT
DEL key combination or hit the reset
key. Either way you will be asked to
confirm that you wish to leave emula¬
tion mode and be returned to CP/M-68k.
Apple emulation: The Apple emula¬
tor presently covers only the Apple II
and the ll-K Emulation is entered by
typing 'APPLE' (surprise, surprise!).
Thesign onscreen is very differentfrom
the IBM version. Whereas options have
to be entered as parameters on the IBM
version, here they can be toggled on
and off by using the function keys.
Much more friendly.
All the Apple expansion slots are
emulated and are as follows: 16k
language card in slot 0, parallel printer
card in slot 1, serial card in slot 2,
80-column card in slot 3, two Apple
disks in slot 6 and the mass storage unit
in slot 7. The system also emulates the
lower case conversion to allow lower
case characters to be entered.
All the above emulations amount to a
fully expanded Apple II. The only odd
option is the 'Mass Storage Unit'. This is
a software device that allows Applesoft
Basic programs to access CP/M-68ktext
files.
The emulator program is designed to
run under DOS 3.3 or ProDos. I tested it
under DOS 3.3. When I first tried to use
the emulator I wasn't very successful
untill read a section in the manual about
a file called APCODE.O.
Benchmarks
BM1
1.6
BM2
5.8
BM3
11.3
BM4
10.7
BM5
13.4
BM6
23.2
BM7
41.5
BM8
29.2
All timings in seconds.
For a full
listing of the Benchmark programs
see 'Direct Access'.
PCW155
INTRODUCING THE NEW
OLIVETTI PERSONAL COMPUTER.
IT'S SO FRIENDLY IT EVEN
GETS ON WITH ITS BIGGEST RIVAL.
FROM £1595'
Address.
Please send me full details on the new Qiuetti M24 Personal Computer
The new Olivetti M24 personal com¬
puter is operationally compatible with its
biggest rival.
This means it can handle all the most
popular software. But it handles it faster.
The M24 also has many other unique
features including a higher resolution
screen with 16 shades of grey.
A modular format that provides
greater expandibility.
And superior ergonomic design.
All at a competitive price.
To find out more call in and see the
M24 in action. _
I 106 St Leonards Road, Windsor,
f\Uj Berkshire,SL43DD
micros umited Tel: Windsor (07535) 50111 Telex:848521
Authorised dealer Authorised IBM dealer
Specialists in Computer Aided Design
oliuetti
156 PC W
□1 u i }
V
r
ilmJ
This is what the manual
says about APCODE.O.
APCODE.O contains certain
information that allows the
"booting" process to proceed faster.
Also, the information stored in
APCODE.O may be needed by the
programs and the operating system on
the computer. In order to respect
certain information that is proprietary
to Apple Computer Inc, Micro Craft
Corporation cannot send an emulation
master diskette with APCODE. 0 already
in place .'
In other words if the emulator is to
work properly it needs bits of DOS 3.3
which are the property of Apple and
which Apple isn't about to give away.
Micro Craft gets around this nasty
little problem by shipping free with
every system a utility disk called The
Filer' made by Central Point Software.
Central Point Software has licensed
DOS 3.3 from Apple, so the disk
containsthe relevant routines. Nowthe
only problem is to copy them over to
your emulation disk.
Micro Craft has taken care of this as
well. First you enter emulation mode
and boot the Filer disk, then you hit the
reset switch and hey presto a menu
appears saying 'FI to save APCODE.O'.
You hit FI and the routines are copied to
your emulation disk.
As soon as I had found out my
success rate at running Apple prog¬
rams increased, so these are obviously
useful routines to have around. The
only question is: is it legal?
I'm not sure that it is. Included with
The Filer' documentation is this
notice:—
VOS 3.3 and Applesoft are copyrighted
programs of Apple Computer, Inc
licensed to Central Point Software, Inc
to distribute for use only in combination
with The Filer. Apple software shall not
be copied onto another diskette (except
for archive purposes) or into memory
unless as part of the execution of The
Filer. When The Filer has completed
execution Apple Software shall not be
used by any other program .'
I'd be interested to hear what other
users think, but it sounds as if copying
those routines isn't legal.
Kaypro emulation: This is just the
same as the previous two: put the
emulation disk in drive B, a Kaypro boot
diskindriveA, hitthe right keys and off it
goes.
In fact the Kaypro emulator was the
only one of the three emulation prog¬
rams with which I had reliability prob¬
lems. It had a nasty habit of bombing
out or not returning to CP/M when I hit
the Break key.
Machine emulation is certainly the
most impressive feature of this
machine. On the whole it has been
executed well; according to Micro Craft
the latest release of the IBM emulator is
an improvement over the version
tested which in turn is pretty good.
I especially like the honest attitude
which Micro Craft has adopted about
what its system will and won't do.
Applications software
No applications software was supplied
with the review machine. This is one of
the major areas that worries me. As I
said before, very few applications
programs are available under CP/M-
68k. You could run the machine in
emulation mode and run, say, IBM
software, but this is only viable as an
upgrade option.
I am not sure if you are better off in
multi-user mode. At the moment the
system is only available under the
Mirage operating system. This is hardly
a mainstream micro, multi-user O/S so
your choice wil be limited again. If or
when Unix and BOS are implemented
the situation should improve.
Although the system wasn't supplied
with any applications software, it did
come with a Basic interpreter for
Benchmark purposes.
The Dimension is shipped with a
version of Basic known as Unibasic.
Apparently this is shipped in different
versions — the review machine came
with the AS version which is very like
Applesoft Basic. This similarity extends
to being ableto run Applesoft programs
directly on the Dimension.Even most of
the PEEKS and POKES are the same.
You'll notice that I say most. The
pages of the manual relating to the
differences were missing. If Unibasic
really is compatible with Applesoft
Basicatthe PEEKand POKE level then it
will merit a review on its own.
One thing that is certain is that
Unibasic version AS is very slow.
When you look at the Benchmarks,
don't forget that they were run on
what is virtually a full-blown 32-bit
processor...
Documentation
The standard of documentation sup¬
plied with the review machine varied.
The CP/M-68k documentation was
standard Digital Research — every¬
thing was there, but this doesn't mean it
was easy to understand.
The Dimension documentation was
supplied in a tightly-packed A5 binder.
In fact the binder was so packed that it
was difficult to get it out of the box.
The documentation was easy to
understand and logical. However, I am
notsurethata novice would havefound
it so straightforward. The manual
makes no attempt to be a tutorial — the
information is pitched at a higher level
than is usual these days. This is not
necessarily a bad thing. This is not a
beginners' machine, so there is no
reason to pitch the documentation at
the beginners' level.
Prices
The Dimension 68000 is imported into
the UK by Tashkl Computer Services of
Wembley. As the machine was original¬
ly priced in dollars, the UK selling price
is liable to vary.
£
Base model with 512kof RAM 3950
Emulationcards 495
Price of review machine 5175
Conclusion
Technically the Dimension is a very
innovative product, and the machine
emulation is well executed for the most
part. My only worry is whether this is a
case of building a machine for its own
sake rather than because the market
needs it.
The Dimension operates at three
levels: as a single-user CP/M-68k
machine; as a standard multi-user
machine; and as a mixture running
emulation.
As a standard single-user machine it
is overpriced and runs an unpopular
version of CP/M. As a multi-user
machine it could be competitive with
the right operating system. As an
emulation machine it is unique as far as
I know.
But I am not sure how large the
market is for this kind of multi¬
personality machine. I feel that its major
appeal will be to people who are
upgrading from, say, an Apple II but
who still want to be ableto run their old
software.
It is not a machine for beginners, it is
not particularly friendly and the docu¬
mentation is not written for beginners.
As long as you bear this in mind you will
be OK. E0
Technical specifications
CPU:
RAM:
ROM:
Keyboard:
Display:
I/O:
Operating systems:
Motorola MC68000 also 6512, Z80 and 8086
slave processors
Upto512konboard
8k
IBM PC copy
Softwareswitchable—default80 x 25
Buscards, games, RS232, parallel printer
CP/M-68k, Mirage (DOS3.3, ProDos, PC-DOS
and CP/M 2.2 under emulation)
PCW157
All leading makes including
IBM, HITACHI, EPSON, APRICOT,
WREN, SANYO, BBC
available FROM STOCK
MADDISON COMPUTERS
104 London Road Headington, Oxford
Tel (0865) 69468
Also OSBORNE, SANYO, SIRIUS and MULTI
USER SYSTEMS FOR BUSINESS.
SOFTWARE, PERIPHERALS, TRAINING,
BACK-UP and PROGRAMMING
17 WEST BAR BANBURY
OXON. (0295) 65023
( 0280 ) 816087 i
WITH EVERY SYSTEM
Bundled software including
Word Processing, Spreadsheet,
BASIC and Operating System
(ALL PRICES + VAT)
_ i"
FRASER
Associates Limited 1 Bristle Hill, Buckingham MK18 1EZ Telephone (0280) 816087
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\
158 PCW
NUMBERS
Factorials & primorials
Mike Mudgeexplores factorials andprimorials whjch are neartoprime.
Definitions
(i) A prime number is a positive integer
which is divisible only by itself and
unity. Thus the infinite sequence of
primenumbersbegins2,3,5,7,11,13 . . .
(ii) The factorial of a positive integer, n,
written n!, is defined^o be the product
of the positive integers less than or
equal to n. Thus 6! = 1X2X3X4X5X6 =
720.
The sequence of factorials begins
1.2.6.24.120.720.. .
(iii) The primorial of a prime number, p,
written p*, is defined to be the product
of the prime numbers less than or equal
to p. Thus 7* = 2X3X5X7 = 210.
The sequence of primorials begins
2.6.30.210.2310.. .
(iv) An integer, q, is said to be near-to-
prime (NTP), if, and only if, either q +1 or
q-1 are prime. (Note that if both q + 1
and q -1 are prime then q is the mean of
a prime pair; see Brun's Constant PCW,
July).
Elementary Facts.
Factorial n is NTP for n = 1,2,3,4,6,7 ...
since 2,3,(5,7), 23,719,5039... are
prime.
Primorial p is NTP for p=2,3,5,7,11 ...
since 3,(5,7), (29,31), 211,(2309,
2311)... are prime.
At least the first twenty-nine NTP
factorials and the first seventeen NTP
primorials are known; however, vir¬
tually nothing is known about their
frequency of occurrence nor abouttheir
significance in analytic numbertheory.
Problem
Readers are invited to design and
implement an algorithm for the deter¬
mination of both NTP primorials and
NTP factorials; attempting to repro¬
duce and, if possible, extend the
present results. Any possible sugges¬
tions as to the significance of these
numbers would be most welcome.
Submissions should include prog¬
ram listings, hardware description, run
time and output; they will be judged for
accuracy, originality and efficiency (not
necessarily in that order) and a prize of
£10 will be awarded to the 'best' entry
received by 1 December 1984. Please
address submissions to Mike Mudge,
'Square Acre', Stourbridge Road, Penn,
Nr Wolverhampton, Staffs WV4 5NF.
Tel: (0902)892141.
Review — Number
Theories — March 1984
The original title was to have been
Number Theory Nostalgia to empha¬
sise the dates of the original solutions.
Submissions included the first Pro
Pascal seen, from a Sirius 880 running
at 5MHz; together with the expected
Basic and Assembler programs run¬
ning on NewBrain, Spectrum and BBC
Model B computers.
(a) Complete solution Math QuestEduc
Times vol 25 1876 p76. (ax 5 .. .dx 5 ),
a+b+c+d= x,x-a = p 5 .. .x-d=s 5 ,x =
(1/3) (p 5 + . . +s 5 ) where p=3m,
q=3m + 1, r= 3m+2, s= 3m+3.
(b) Amer Math Monthly vol 2. 1895
ppl28-9.
(c) Amer Math Monthly\/ ol 5.1890 pi 14
also vol 8. 1901 pp48-9. Consider the
solution 3 5 -D, 3 5 , and 3 5 +D ...
(d) L'intermediaire des math vol 11,
1904, ppl 6-7; the only known exception
is 23.
(e) L'intermediaire des math vol 24,
1917 pp23-41; the only known addition
being 8191 = 1+2+ . . +2 12 =
1+90+90 2 .
This month's winner is John B Cook
of 34 Joan Crescent, East Burwood,
3151 (232-2126), Australia, who used a
TRS PC-2 with printer, as necessary.
Johnused6.71 hoursCPU timeon (e)
while Teilhet's limit of 600 in (d) was
extended to 1800 in about IV 2 days.
Please note that submissions can
only be returned if a suitable stamped
addressed envelope is provided.
LEISURE LINES
byJJ
Clessa
Peter
Quentin
Roger
Stanley
Bird 1
Bluebird
Egret
Cockatoo
Egret
Bird 2
Auk
Auk
Bluebird
Auk
Bird 3
Cockatoo
Bluebird
Drongo
Cockatoo
Bird 4
Egret
Bluebird
Egret
Bluebird
Bird 5
Bluebird
Drongo
Auk
Drongo
Quickie
Divide 10 pounds of sugar into three
portions so that three times the smal¬
lest portion equals the middle portion,
and four times the middle portion
equals the largest portion.
Prize Puzzle
A test of logic this month.
On the island of Nonesuch there are five
species of birds:
— the Auk
— the Bluebird
— the Cockatoo
— the Drongo, and
— the Egret
Four birdwatchers, Peter, Quentin,
Roger and Stanley, are located at
different parts of the island when five
different birds fly over in rapid succes¬
sion. Each man makes his own identi¬
fication of the birds, and the results are:
In fact, none of the birdwatchers
identified all the birds correctly, but
conversely, no one had them all incor¬
rect either. No two birdwatchers had
the same numbers of incorrect gues¬
ses, and each of the five birds was
correctly identified by at least one
birdwatcher.
What were the five birds?
Answers, on postcards only, to PCW
Prize Puzzle September 1984, Leisure
Lines, 62 Oxford Street, London W1, to
arrive not later than last post on 30
September 1984
June Prize Puzzle
A massive response to the June puzzle
— almost 400 entries were received,
most of them with the correct solution.
The problem was easily solved by
micro by testing all possible 6-digit
square numbersforthe required condi¬
tions. The required numbers (excluding
solutions with leading zeros) are:
494209 = (703) 2
and
998001 =(999) 2
The winning entry drawn at random
from the pile came from Dr David Vaux
of the John Radcliffe hospital, Oxford.
Congratulations Dr Vaux. Your pri ze is
on its way. HTH
PCW 159
SORTSPEEDS
Beatthe
dock
Thejperform^nce qfdifferentsoi-tmethods can change
drwvaticajlywhen are-sorf/sreqfu/red. TonyWiiijams
pitcfTed^omejwmni a/me/nor^sorfsaga/nsf/?/ssfopwafc/7.
Ifyou usea microcomputertosort large
files you may find the amount of
available memory a serious limitation.
For example, a file of 400 records, each
80 characters long, will require 32,000
bytes not including the space for
overheads andthe program (a record is
a unit of information: that is, a person's
name, telephone number and address).
Large files will certainly require the use
of a disk so that parts of files can be
sorted and merged.
Obviously, the more disk manipula¬
tion used, the slower the job becomes
—to a point where the process is of little
interestto most users. However,files of
a useful size can be sorted on a micro
without the use of a disk, particularly if
care is taken in the design of the record
so as to minimise its size. It will also be
wise to choose a sorting method which
doesnotmakedemandson memoryfor
temporary workspace.
Minimal memory
methods
A number of 'minimal memory'
methods are available and some
theoretical and practical comparisons
of their performance have been pub¬
lished. There is less information on
re-sort performance, which is a pity
because very often one is not interested
in the time required to set up a sorted
file as the time required to add or delete
a few records and then re-sort them.
Sort techniques, at least for minimal
memory methods, all depend upon
comparison and are closely related to
search methods. It is first necessary to
define the search key; if your records
comprise name, telephone number
and address you might decide to sort
the records in alphabetic order of
names. The name part of each record
then becomes the key.
Let's assume that our keys are
numeric and are to be sorted into
ascending order (we could just as well
sort into descending order if desired).
The most obvious and simple techni¬
que is usually called sequential sorting.
Considerthe sequence ofdigits 34 21 5;
it is required to sort these into 1 2 3 4 5.
The procedure isto takethefirst (that
is, 3) and compare this in turn with each
of the others until a smaller one is found
(2). 2 is then compared with the
remainder of the sequence until the
smallest is found (1). 1 is then removed
from the sequence and the digits
shuffled to the right to close the gap. It is
then placed at the head of the file and
the process repeated on the rest of the
file, and so on. This is the only method
which allows you to print each sorted
record as it's produced: with the other
methods it is necessary forthe whole of
the file to be sorted before it can be
printed. This is perhaps its only virtue
but notto be ignored ifyou are working
with a slow printer.
The number of comparisons re¬
quired is often taken as a measure of
speed and in this case is approximately
n 2 /2 where n is large and equal to the
number of records. The method takes
approximately the same time no matter
how well the file is initially sorted, so is
unlikely to be a good choice for
re-sorting.
Another method, attractive because
of its compact program, is called
bubble sorting. Consider again the
same sequence: comparethefirstdigit
with the second; if the second is smaller
swap them, compare the second with
the third, if the third is smaller swap,
and so on, to the end of the sequence.
This gives 3 2 1 4 5 as a first attempt;
the process is.repeated on the whole
sequence until no further swaps are
made. It is slow on unsorted files but
better than sequential and promises to
be good on well-sorted files, and for a
completely sorted file requires only n
comparisons.
The bubble sort can be improved by
searching for the best place to put an
out-of-order record when this has been
detected by a comparison. This can be
done by applying a sequential search as
in the sequential sort method, produc¬
ing a program that is somewhat faster
for an initial sort and dramatically faster
at re-sorting. The use of a binary search
gives even better performance for an
initial sort (a binary search consists of
halving the search area, finding in
which half the target lies, halving that
area, and so on), but the program is
quite long and complicated.
The Shell method is somewhat simi¬
lar to bubble sorting but instead of
comparing adjacent keys, those some
distance apart are compared and ex¬
changed if necessary. The distance
apart diminishes at each pass through
the file. It's common practice to make
the distances a half, quarter, eighth,
sixteenth, and so on, of the file length
but other sequences are used. A very
compact Fortran version is given by
160 PCW
Berztiss (1) and a Basic version by Mike
Niklaus (2). The method always makes
the same number of comparisons
which, according to Berztiss, is of the
order n 3 / 2 .
The sort performance tests were
executed using a file consisting of
records 66 characters long. The sort
operated on the characters 0-9, A-Z and
a-z in that order of precedence with all
other ASCII characters ignored. The
records were held in memory as a
sequence of bytes (not array elements)
& without pointers to minimise memory
| demand. All programs were written in
Q machine code for a Commodore 8032.
o For the re-sort tests the four 66-byte
§ records 1 ... 1, a ... a, m . . . m and
^ z . . . z were appended to the file,
c The basic sequential sort and basic
\§ bubble tests were executed on a file of
2 390 records. The results, shown here,
^ were so poor that no further tests were
^ made on these methods:
Sort
Re-sort
time
time
(sec)
(sec)
SEQUENTIAL:
77
43
BUBBLE:
143
93
The table below
shows
the byte
length foreach of the programs (it does
not include additional common sub¬
routines):
Program
length: byte
SEQUENTIAL 535
BUBBLE 406
BUBBLE/SEQUENTIAL 468
BUBBLE/BINARY 519
SHELL 659
Conclusion
These results indicate that the best
all-rounder is the bubble/sequential
program. It's a quick sorter, a very quick
re-sorter and uses only a modest
amount of memory. If you are desper¬
ate for space then the bubble sort would
be your choice but it's very slow. The
Shell method is outstanding for initial
sorting and is easy to program.
As an additional guide to choice, I
executed a further trial on the Shell and
bubble/sequential methods. This con¬
sisted of sorting 969 records, each 24
characters long, using the whole of the
record as the key. The time in seconds
to sort, re-sort with four added linesand
re-sort with 20 added lines was 16.5,7.0
and7.5for'Shell'and 198 (yes 198!),3.0
and 9.5 for bubble/sequential. This
illustrates that the choice of method
must be guided by requirements and
the ideal would be to maintain a library
of sort routines.
References
1 Berztiss AT Data Structures,
Academic Press New York 1975
ZBest of the Commodore PET Newslet¬
ter, Commodore Business machines
UK Ltd 1980 Q33
PCW161
SensMe solution?
Sensible Solution^ is a powerful and flexible database intended^ foruse
on networked^ micros . /And Kathy Lang believes it_ will be ofparticujar
benefit to system developers.
Most data management systems are
intended to be used by one person at a
time. If you have a networked micro¬
computer system where several people
each have a computer but can share the
same information, such packages are
not suitable, because there is always
the danger that two people will be
trying to change a single record at the
same time — with unpredictable con¬
sequences for the accuracy of the data,
and, at worst, a system crash. In recent
months, more packages suitable for
running on shared systems have be¬
come available at £1000 or less.
In the June issue I looked at System
Builder, a database which enables
several users to share information on a
micro whicn operates like a convention¬
al mainframe; each user sharing not
only the processor but a common pool
of information. This month, I'll be
looking at Sensible Solution, an Amer¬
ican package designed for use on
networked microcomputers, where
each user has a terminal, keyboard and
processor, and shares only the hard
disk storage and the information it
contains.
In order for such sharing to be
practicable, the package must be able to
prevent more than one user changing
the same item of information at the
same time. This is done by 'locking' the
information, allowing only the first user
attempting to make a change the ability
to do so. Such locking may be at field
level, so that only one item, such as a
name or account number, is locked; at
the record level, so that only a single
customer's record is protected from
two people trying to change it simul¬
taneously; or file level. Whichever
method is used, control over access to
files is the province of the operating
system, so sharing can only be im¬
plemented by using operating system
features which permit locking.
Of these possible methods of locking,
file locking is the easiest to implement,
and is widely available. However, it
imposes severe constraints on the
user'sflexibilityofworking. One reason
for the extent to which the development
of more flexible approaches has lagged
behind the development of the hard¬
ware, is that there is a wide variety of
operating systems for networked mic¬
ros; and such systemstendto be highly
hardware-specific — that is, they are
often available just on one range
of hardware. Although they may all
lookalike ifyou are running single-user
software (running either CP/M or MS-
DOS single-user programs), the
approachesto implementing the multi¬
user features, such as record locking,
have been many and various.
For this review I used a Data Dyna¬
mics Sig/Net multi-user micro (a British
system), on which Sensible Solution
has been implemented through the
MCNOS operating system.
As you might expect from a system
designed for shared use, Sensible
Solution contains a variety of powerful
features. It is in essence an applications
generator; that is, every task which the
user wants to carryout — entering data
through a screen display, reporting on
the printer, selecting sections of the
information for screen enquiry — is
carried out by a 'program' written in
Sensible Solution's own language. For
the beginner, such programs are con¬
structed by the package itself, through a
program generator; such programs
may be modified by the user, or they
TheSensibleSoJution Language
Version 2.0
MAIN MENU
1) Execute A SENSIBLE SOLUTION
Program
2) Data Dictionary Maintenance
3) Screen Painting
4) SourceCodeEditor
5) Initialise A Data File
6) CompileSourceCode
7) RekeyA Data File
8) RestructureAData File
9) Program Generator
10) Inquire
## Enter Your Choice From Options
Above
Fig 1 Main Menu
may be created from scratch.
Sensible Solution is, in the main, a
two-level package, consisting of the
features it offers a system designer,
plus the features which it enables a
system designer to offer naive users.
An expert user would be ableto use the
system in a more direct way, but would
still need to create or generate Sensible
Solution programs to carry out tasks. It
allows you to invoke its functions
(including running programs) via a
single menu (shown in Fig 1), or directly
from the operating system; the system
designer can use the programming
language to create screens which con¬
tain other menus for naive users. Once
into a function or program, commands
are in general issued by pressing the
ESCape key to display a menu of
options occupying several lines at the
top or bottom of the screen.
Sensible Solution uses a fixed for¬
mat, fixed length record structure, but
allows you to associate a number of
files (where a file contains a set of
records all with the same structure)
together during processing, so the
combined record structure can be very
flexible. Definitions of all fields in all
files are stored in a single data diction¬
ary. This means that you may not
duplicate field names within one data¬
base, even if the fields are in different
files. However, the advantage that any
reference to a field will automatically
pick up the correct field, without you
explicitly having to tell the system that
the Part Number referred to in a
customer's order is the same field as the
Part Number in a stock record.
It may by now lookto many readers as
though Sensible Solution has a lot in
common with other systems based on
procedural languages, such as dBasell
and Condor, but with the advantages of
a more powerful facility for associating
several files together, plus the ability to
lock records and thus permit file¬
sharing. However, Sensible Solution
lacks any in-built commands, so you
can't carry out information processing
directly by executing a single command
with parameters on the command line
— you could simulate this approach,
162 PCW
Package
Maximumfilesize
Max record size
Maxnofields
Maxfieldsize
Maxdigits
Max prime key length
Special diskformat?
Filesizefixed?
Link to ASCII files?
Datatypes
Fixed record
structure?
Fixed record length
stored?
Amend record
structure?
Linkdata files?
Nodata filesopen
Nosortfields
No keys
Maxkey length
(chars,fields)
Subsidiary indexes
kept up-to-date?
Datavalidation
Screenformatting
Uniquekeys
Reportformatting
Storecalculateddata
Totals&Statistics
Storeselection
criteria
Combiningcriteria
>1 criterion /field?
Wild code selection?
Browsing methods
I Interaction methods
Reference Manual
(max5*)
Tutorial Guide-f (max ***
5*)
ReferenceCard+ N
(max5*)
On-Line Help-f (max **
5*)
Hot-line? D
Fig 2 Features andconstrain ts
but by building the 'commands', as
Sensible Solution programs. It is, there¬
fore, most likely to be suited to environ¬
ments where a system designer is
setting up applications for others to
use, and for expert users who need a
powerful multi-file database manage¬
ment system.
Constraints
The major constraints on use of Sensi¬
ble Solution are shown in Fig 2. Few of
these are likely to worry the average
user, since they are much more gener¬
ous than usual — in most cases you will
run up against operating system and
memory limitations first. The restric¬
tions which could become important
are more subtle. Firstly, to increase
speed of access, Sensible Solution
Sensible
Solution
OSL
Memory limit
1000
(255/screen)
255
15
72
No
No
Yes
C,N,D,Overlay
Yes
Yes
Bycopying
Yes
16
1 atatime
9 + record no
72,1
Yes
Good
Paint-a-screen
Optional
Default,
paint-a-screen
Yes
Yes
Permitted
Andinlnquiry
And,Orin
programs
Yes
String within
Any Key
Menus,Full
Tailoring
stores data records in 128-character
blocks, so a record which contains 140
characters would use two blocks with a
lot of wasted space at the end of the
second. This would mean that users
would need to think about the appropri¬
ate location of fields, not only in terms
of the data structure itself, but also in
terms of storage efficiency. Another
limitation is that a single screen format
may occupy only one physical screen;
you can have more than one screen
format accessed during a program, but
this could involve more overheads in
file updating than using explicitly linked
screens.
A positive point not obvious from the
table is that, by obeying some simple
rules, you can create a group of single
fields (character, numeric or date)
which can be treated as a one¬
dimensional array. Another useful fea¬
ture is that date formats may take
severalforms,includingtheDD/MM/YY
format popular in the UK; you specify
your preference when the system is
initially set up.
File creation
Before data can be entered into a file,
four steps have to be taken. Firstly, you
must define all the fields which the
records will contain, including identify¬
ing up to 10 key fields, and store this
information in the data dictionary.
Secondly, the data and key files must be
initialised. Thirdly, you must format a
data entry screen (which may contain
fields from records in several different
files). Finally, you must create, or ask
Sensible Solution to create, a program
which will enable the fields in each
record to be filled in via the screen
format, and the record saved in the file.
There are several approaches to
carrying out these tasks. In the early
stages of using Sensible Solution, most
people will follow the method sug¬
gested in the tutorial manual, and set
out a screen format and define its fields
in one operation, using option 3 on the
main menu. This allows you to 'paint-a-
screen' with captions and prompt text
wherever you like, including the option
to draw boxes and lines by having
Sensible Solution follow the move¬
ment of the cursor.
Once the overall screen layout is
decided, your next step is to define the
position and nature of each field. To do
this, you position the cursor at the start
ofthe first field you wish to define, press
ESCape to get the bottom line's display
of options, and indicate that you wish to
add a field. An option is selected either
by entering its single letter abbreviation
— usually its first letter, for example 'D'
for delete a line ofthe screen format —
or by pressing the space bar once for
each option until that desired is high¬
lighted, and then pressing Return. This
device makes it possible to have the
most commonly used option as the
default, for which you only need to
press Return. But even though 'Add
field' isthe default option here, that still
meansyou must press ESC followed by
Return once for each field to be set up.
Once you have indicated that you
wish to add a field, you are then
presented with a list of parameters for
defining it, such as its name, the file into
which it is to be saved (since one screen
format may contain information from
several data files — this defaults to the
filename entered for the first field),
length, type and so on. Here you may
specify a validation mask, to ensure that
correct data is entered; validation
allows both the format of the data (two
letters followed by three numbers in an
account code, say) is correct, and that
the content is accurate. It is possible to
specify that only certain values are valid
(individual values and/or ranges for
both letters and numbers) or that
certain values are invalid. You can also
specify that all or part of a field is
mandatory.
You can also ask for data to be stored
in upper case, however it is entered,
specify that a field is to be a key field,
and so on. However, if you don't need
any of these options — if just name,
length and type are the only varying
items — there seems to be no way to
display all the defaults and to accept
them all at once. You have to press
Return once for each parameter, even if
you want the default values and you
can't say 'Create another field just like
the last except that its name should
be .. So, all in all, setting up field
formats in this way is rather tedious.
An alternative and faster method of
defining fields is to edit the data
dictionary directly, from option 2 on the
menu. This displays a split screen, the
upper half containing file information,
the lower half showing the specification
of one field atatime. Using this method
you can set up a field specifying just
those parameters you need, though
you still can't automatically set up a
group of identical fields. This option
also allows you to print a copy ofthe file
format.
Whichever method is used to create
the definition, the file must then be
initialised, and a Sensible Solution
program created to allow data entry to,
and amendment of, the file. You can
request Sensible Solution to do this for
you, by invoking option 9 (which also
initialises the data file if it has not yet
been done). This sets up a group of
Sensible Solution command state¬
ments which will constitute a source
program, and then compile it into an
executable program. Alternatively, you
can set up your own program, either by
amending the one generated by Sensi¬
ble Solution, or by creating your own.
Data input and updating
Entering and changing information
involves executing a Sensible Solution
program containing appropriate EN¬
TER and calculation statements. Fig 3
shows the program set up to handle
data entry to the Benchtest file. When
run, this program interacts with the
PCW163
control available from the keyboard, so
that in practice it doesn't run for ever!
For instance, to save a record you press
ESC and then 'S' which transfers
control to the statement labelled
SAVE.GRP, and then returns to START;
when you have finished entering or
amending records, you can press ESC
and invoke the Quit option to stop
execution of the entry program.
When entering a new record, simply
fill in the fields displayed. To select a
record for amendment, you can search
fora particular value contained in a key
field, and/or scroll through the file in
order by any key field. Searching works
by matching against the number of
characters entered, so to search for
Smith but not Smithson you would
have to enter Smith<space>. I couldn't
always persuade key field searching to
work correctly if the data field were full
— in some cases when the whole field
was entered, searching simply display¬
ed the first record in the file.
As an alternative to interactive data
entry and amendment, you can set up a
Sensible Solution program which will
add or update records automatically.
However, there didn't seem to be any
clean way to end such a program
without returning to the keyboard to get
the user to Quit explicitly.
Page No: 0001
%o: PCWBT.SRRsource filelisting
remark
trap SAVE goto
SAVE.GRP
trapDELETEgoto
DELT.GRP
mount screen PCWBT
enterREFNUM
enter BT.NAME
enter DATECRE
enter BT.TYPE
enter BT.DESCRPN
enterSUPPI
enterPRICEl
enterSUPP2
enterPRICE2
enterSUPP3
enterPRICE3
enterSUPP4
enterPRICE4
enterSYSI
enterSYS2
enterSYS3
enterRATING
enterREFI
enter REF2
enterREF3
enterREF4
0001
0002
0003
0004
0005 START
0006
0007
0008
0009
0010
0011
0012
0013
0014
0015
0016
0017
0018
0019
0020
0021
0022
0023
0024
0025
0026 SAVE.GRPsaverec in file PCWBT
confirm/clear buffer
0027 goto START
0028 DELT.GRP delete rec infile
PCWBT
0029 goconfirm
goto START
Fig 3 Sensible Solution program
Printed reports
Two options are available. You can set
up a report layout using the 'paint-a-
screen' approach and invoke it via a
Sensible Solution program; report lay¬
outs are very similar to screen layouts,
except that they allow you to specify
report lines up to 254 characters wide.
For lines up to 127 characters wide, a
simple form of sideways scrolling is
used; for wider printing, two screen
lines are needed to display each report
line. To create totals and sub-totals
within such a report, you must include
appropriate lines of Sensible Solution
code in your program — there is no
short-cut via the program generator for
this. The alternative to a formatted
report is a quick report generated by the
Inquiry option, which can be directed to
the printer (or to a disk file) rather than
to the screen.
Selection and sorting
Any record may be selected for screen
display by using the Find option on a
key field; matches must be exact, but
need be on only the first few characters
in a field. Thus you may use Find to
search for a field starting with a group of
characters, but not use a 'wild code' to
find a set of characters within a field.
In the Inquiry option, you can select
using the usual comparison operators,
<, > etc, and also for a field containing a
particular set of characters; if you
specify more than one field to select on,
then tests are 'anded'; that is, only
records which pass all tests will be
displayed.
For both screen display and printed
reports using Sensible Solution pro¬
grams, and within the Inquiry quick
report program, records may be shown
in order by any key field, or by record
number. If you want to display the
records ordered in any other way, then
you must make the field on which you
wantto sorta key field,and re-indexthe
file.
Calculation
Calculations may be performed on
fields from data files, employing the
usual arithmetic operators on con¬
stants or field values. If you need
intermediate variables, perhaps to
accumulate a total, you have to set up a
'dummy' or memory variable in a file
which you would reserve for the
purpose. (Thefilewould nottakeupany
space, since no data would be stored —
it is merely a device for reserving areas
of memory for working storage.) You
can simulate one-dimensional arrays
by creating a set of fields of the same
type and length, with names which will
result in the fields being stored next to
one another. Sensible Solution stores
all variables in the data dictionary in
alphabetical order offield within file, so
you would just give your array ele¬
ments names like ZZA, ZZB, and so on,
to ensure contiguity. You can then use a
memory variable together with the
name of the first variable in the list as a
pointer to whichever variable you
actually need — a value of two would
point to the second field in the list, for
instance. This feature could be ex¬
tremely useful when processing
grouped information, such as accumu¬
lating sales information by month.
Multiple files and file
sharing
Sensible Solution allows you to access
fields from up to 16 files on a single
screen, and to use program statements
to check that where several files are in
use, the correct record is updated
where it could be ambiguous.
The use of a data dictionary requiring
every field name to be unique to the
whole database does away with the
need to specify where any particular
field is located. File sharing is allowed
by specifying either file locking or
individual record locking, with a variety
of options available to the programmer
and the user when contention for a
record arises.
Tailoring
Given that Sensible Solution contains a
(somewhat crude) programming lan¬
guage, most forms of tailoring are
available. Using the dodge for creating
memory variables, together with the
facility for one Sensible Solution pro¬
gram to call another, you can set up
menus to help users who need only to
use programs set up by others. You can
also create data entry and display
programs to suit most circumstances.
The tools provided are powerful and
flexible, but some are rather more
primitive in their implementation than I
would have liked.
For example, the only form of bran¬
ching provided is a simple "GO" —
either GOTO a label or GOSUB..RE¬
TURN. No structured programming
here! GOTO can branch either to a
specific label, orto oneof several based
onthe result of a memory variable, thus
giving the effect which is achieved in
many languages by a CASE statement.
On the other hand, there is no explicit
iterative execution — no equivalent of
FOR...NEXT, although you can of
course simulate that with IF and a
memory variable. Nor is there a DO-
...WHILE, though again that can be
simulated.
In addition to enabling you to chain
several of its own programs together,
Sensible Solution also allows you to
164 pc w
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invoke other executable programs
(those with the suffix .com in CP/M-80,
for instance) directly. So it would be
possible to devise a completely inte¬
grated application which would, for
instance, set up a data file which could
be read by a word processor, branch to
the word processor to run standard
letters, and then return to Sensible
Solution.
Links with outside
Sensible Solution data files are held in
plain ASCII text form, in units of 128
characters, with each field occupying a
fixed amount of space. If your existing
data file can be converted to this format
(and any programming language, in¬
cluding Basic,can writesuchfiles) itcan
be read by Sensible Solution.
For writing text files, you can either
use the data file direct, or create a text
file on disk in a variety of formats, using
thelnquiryoption.
User image
I found Sensible Solution an extra¬
ordinary mixture of the helpful, the
obscure and the tedious. Personally, I
do not favour the two-level approach,
whereby you have to set up a prede¬
fined set of instructions before you can
actually do anything. On the other
hand, Sensible Solution attempts to
cover this by providing a program
generator to cope with simple cases,
which works quite well. I also liked the
approach of providing commands
within formatting and data entry
screens, and the ability to get to the
appropriate part of the system from a
single menu.
The approach used to set up and edit
Sensible Solution programs from
scratch is much less helpful. At each
stage, instead of entering a command
line which is then checked, you have to
create a command line on a question-
and-answer basis for each element in
the command.
The other aspect of the package
which isirritating isSensibleSolution's
cavalierattitudeto carriage returns. For
instance, the main menu has 10 op¬
tions. If you want any of the single digit
options, you must enter the number
and press Return. If you want item 10,
you must type 10 and not press Return
— if you do, Sensible Solution assumes
thatthis is a null response to its request
for a file name on which to inquire, and
returnsyoutothemainmenu . . .
Documentation
Sensible Solution comes with two
manuals in a single binder. Both are
printed on large pages of a non¬
standard size — smallerthan A4, larger
than A5 or the IBM PC manual format.
The text has been prepared with a
typewriter, so there are no subtleties of
typography to helpthe reader, nordoes
either manual have an index. The first
manual is a tutorial introduction to
Sensible Solution, using sample files
supplied with the package. This pro-
videsa good introduction to mostofthe
features of the package, including a
gentle introduction to using the pro¬
gramming language. However, anyone
who had meta programming language
before would, I think, feel the lack of any
overview of its capabilities.
This is even more obvious in the
Reference Manual. This consists of a
section on each of the menu options,
followed by a description of each
command (not in alphabetical order).
Even when you have worked through
the tutorial, the reference manual is
quite hard going because of the lack of a
model of the approach taken by the
package. This lack, combined with the
absence of an index, makes it quite hard
to work out where to look for particular
features.
Conclusion
Sensible Solution provides powerful
and flexible features for people who
need to design database management
systems for others to use. Its combina¬
tion of facilities and the use of the
Inquiry option for naive users' ad hoc
reports makes Sensible Solution a
good packagefor use in such situations.
The programming features leave a
certain amount to be desired in some
respects — notably the lack of struc¬
tured forms of conditional execution.
The selection and ordering features
provided as standard are also less
powerful than one might have
expected.
On the other hand, the package does
provide the ability to relate multiple
files together in a straightforward way,
and to allow file sharing through record
locking in multi-user environments.
Despite the need to spatter programs
with GOTOs, the programming lan¬
guage is readable and reasonably
easy to use. For system developers,
Sensible Solution would be a useful
tool, but would probably be beyond the
scope of most ordinary users. p!TT
Summary
PackageType
Database managementsystem with subset of
featuresforsimpleapplications. Full system has
record locking and multi-filefeatures
Ease of Use
Good for system designers, if rathertediousattimes.
Difficultfor novices
ErrorMessages
Good—hasTracefacility in programming language
Documentation
Tutorial manual quitegood, referenceadequate
Costs (ex VAT)
£548 single user, £775 multi-user
Supplier
UKdistributor: O'Hanlon Systems,tel: (0753)78844
ALondondealer: SmallTurnkey Systems, tel: (01)
2723530
Benchmarks
BM1 Timetoaddonenewrecordlnst (5secs)
BM2 Timetoselectrecordbyprimarykeylnst (3secs)
BM3 Timeto select record by secondary keylnst (3secs)
BM4 Timeto access 20 recordsfrom 1000sequentially on 3-characterfield
(samefieldasinBM2key)1min (18mins 53secs*)
BM5 Timeto access record using wildcodelnst (3secs)
BM6 Timeto index 1000 records on 3-characterfield
15mins 40secs (1 hr 26mins*)
BM7 Time to sort 1000 records on 5-characterfield N A
BM8 Timeto calculate on onefield per record and store result in record
lOmins 25secs (49mins 27secs*
BM9 Timeto total threefieldsover 1000 records
6mins 25 secs (23mins 20secs*)
BM10 Time to add one newf ield to each of 1000 records
5mins 40secs (28mins 53secs*)
Timeto importafileof 1000records: (47mins 47secs*)
Firsttimes quoted are for hard disk version. Times in brackets are for Siriuswith
floppy disks; *= estimated from time for 150 seconds. NA = Not Applicable; can
oniyindex
166 PCW
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fA?reaffof/iemac/i/ne , spop(i/ar/f/. PeterBrightassesses two new clones,
tjw OHyetti M24andthe MAPI, whjch appear technically superior to the PC.
How do you compete with the IBM PC?
Until recently the answer (especially
in the US) seemed to be that you don't.
PC clones have generally been sub¬
standard in some way and have not
presented a real challenge to the PC in
the mass market.
Now a new breed of clone seems to
be appearing, which is technically more
advanced than the IBM PC but which
can still run PC software. Both the
machines tested here are technically
aheadofthePC:theMAD1 usesthenew
Intel 80186 16-bit central processor and
the Olivetti M24 uses a very fast Intel
8086.
When it comes to marketing, the two
machines are very different. The Italian
electronicsgiantOlivetti hasteamed up
with AT&T in the US to try to meet IBM
head on in the mass market. MAD, on
the other hand, is looking for low
volume high price sales atthetop end of
the PC market.
Olivetti M24
Hardware
From the beginning the M24 was
designed to be IBM-compatible. Given
that fact, the machine does a good job of
not looking too much like an IBM clone.
The main unit has a smaller 'footprint'
than the IBM but is slightly taller. Above
that sits the display which can be tilted
or swivelled anyway. The whole unit is
finished in different shades of grey with
a black stripe along the front.
At the front of the main unit are two
IBM-compatible, half-height 5V4in flop¬
py disk drives, a power light and the
reset button. The disks are disturbingly
quiet — once or twice I was convinced
they weren't working!
My major worry about the disks is
that the airforthe cooling fan is sucked
over them into the machine. Conse¬
quently all my disks gathered a heavy
coating of dust — although this didn't
cause any problems during the test, I
haveafeelingthatitcould bea problem
over a more prolonged period.
The back of the machine houses the
fan, printer port, RS232 port and slots
for expansion cards. The RS232 and
printer ports are very badly designed.
For a start, the printer port uses a 'D'
plug even though it's a Centronics port.
The only reason I can see for doing this
is to force IBM-alike users to pay over
the odds for special cables. In addition,
both the printer port and the RS232 port
are recessed into the back panel, which
makes it very difficult to get a proper
connection when you plug in a cable.
Ofivetti M24 vs MADl
The IBJV[ PC^ has spawned^ manyjookaiikes butnorm so farhas posedjisenous
168 PC W
The Olivetti has two different keyboards: the IBM lookalike (as shown above) or the Olivetti design
Access to all the internals is straight¬
forward. If you want to get to the power
supply, disk drives, video circuitry or
the expansion board, you simply slack¬
en two screws on the back panel and
slide the lid off the main unit.
To get at the main PCB it's necessary
to turn the unit upside down, undo two
more screws and slide the bottom panel
off. This is a much better arrangement
than on the IBM where the main PCB is
buried below the disk drives.
The PCBsthemselves were very early
beta test versions and had been heavily
patched; this didn't seem to affect the
operation of the system — everything
was 100% reliable.
The only serious problem I had with
the system occurred when I tried to
install the optional bus convertor. This
plugs into a slot in the video board and
allows expansion cards to be plugged
into the system. (I accidentally shorted
the convertor against the chassis and
when I switched on I blew up the main
PCB. I hope that later machines will
include a piece of plasticto insulate the
chassis and make this impossible.)
The great advantage of the bus
convertor is that it will take both Olivetti
Benchmarks: Olivetti
M24
BM1
0.8
BM2
2.5
BM3
5.2
BM4
5.2
BM5
5.7
BM6
10.0
BM7
15.3
BM8
16.6
Average
7.7
AII timings in seconds. Fora full listing
of the Benchmark programs see
'Direct Access'.
and standard IBM expansion cards. The
Olivetti cards are designed to make use
of the extra data lines on the 8086, so
they have to be plugged into specially
expanded slots on the board. IBM cards
can fit into any of the other slots.
The Benchmark timings show that
the Olivetti is a very fast machine
(certainly much faster than the IBM).
This is largely due to the fact that it uses
an Intel 8086 processor running flat out
at 8MHz as opposed to the IBM which
uses an 8088 running at 4.77MHz. This
increase in speed is only apparent when
you see both machines running the
same software—then you wonder why
you put up with the IBM for so long.
The review machine was supplied
with 245k of RAM which is the most that
can be accommodated on the main
board. Extra RAM can be plugged into
the expansion slots.
The Olivetti also came with two
different keyboards: one was laid out in
the same style as an IBM keyboard and
the other was of Olivetti's own design.
They are both equipped with nine-pin
'D' sockets for Olivetti's mouse. The
IBM-style keyboard is equipped with 83
keys while the Olivetti home brew
keyboard boasts 102.
I preferred the layout of the Olivetti
keyboard. Although it has more keys,
there is more space between the
different groups of keys which makes it
easier to find the required key. The extra
space is provided because the Olivetti
keyboard has its function keys running
along the top of the keyboard, whereas
the IBM version packsthefunction keys
down the left-hand side.
Although I preferred the layout of the
pukka Olivetti keyboard, I suspect that
most users will goforthe IBM version if
only to avoid confusion when they are
running IBM software.
I tried both keyboards and didn't like
the feel of either of them: they both felt
plastic and fragile. After I had been
using the IBM-style keyboard for a
while the space bar started to stick. I
eventually fixed it by striking it a sharp
blow with an Inmac acoustic coupler —
it hasn't caused any trouble since!
The display is wonderful. The review
machine was supplied with a
monochrome monitorwhich plugsinto
the video board on the back of the main
unit via a large 'D' plug.
Instead of the normal green or amber
display, the Olivetti uses a shade of
blue/white on a black background.
Although this may sound strange, it's
very neat and easy to read.
At one level the Olivetti is compatible
with IBM high-res graphics, but it also
offers a higher resolution of 640 x 400
pixels when used with custom Olivetti
software.
Although the system is only supplied
with a black and white screen, it's also
quite happy to support grey scaling in
additionto normal blackand white.The
result is that IBM programs will usually
run better if you pretend that you're
using a colour system and grey scaling
rather than a straight monochrome
screen.
I only fully appreciated the screen
when I put the Olivetti nextto a standard
IBM PC. Whereas the characters on the
IBM screen look fat and bloated, the
Olivetti's are compact and easy to read.
The Olivetti also updates its screen
much faster than the IBM; this may
seem a small point, butthesethingsare
important when you spend a long time
sitting in front of it.
System software
The Olivetti is shipped with MS-DOS
version 2.11. This is the international
PC W169
version of MS-DOS which
allows different local key-
boardsto be setup. In addition
to the national character sets, Olivetti
has also included drivers for the two
different system keyboards.
Having said that the machine is
shipped with MS-DOS, I must admit
that I never had occasion to use it.
Instead I used my PC-DOS version 2
masterdiskwhich I usually use with real
IBM PCs; this worked with no com¬
plaints. The only problem is that
PC-DOS is not set up to take the time and
date from the Olivetti's real-time clock,
whereas the pukka Olivetti version of
MS-DOS will do that automatically.
Applications software
In the course of testing the Olivetti I
experimented with a wide range of
applications software which was origi¬
nally designed to run on the IBM PC. It
all worked with the exception of a
database package which was written in
IBM BASICA. IBM lookalikes won't
usually run BASICA programs because
some of the routines are contained in
the IBM ROM, which is copyright IBM.
Manufacturers understandably don't
want to pay IBM's licensing fees. Most
lookalikes get around this problem by
using GWBASIC, which is virtually the
same as BASICA but which does not
rely on the IBM ROM routines.
The Olivetti was supplied with
GWBASICfor Benchmarking purposes.
This isa fast machine; the only systems
which beat it have great, hulking
Motorola 68000s in them.
Due to the Olivetti's fast screen
handling, packages like WordStar and
Microsoft's Flight Simulator look better
on the Olivetti than on the PC.
A good test of the more esoteric
aspects of compatibility is to use the
Perfect Link communications package
from Perfect software. This not only
makes heavy use of the RS232 port but
also accesses the disk controller to
allow the drives to read alien disk
formats. The 01 ivetti worked just as wel I
in these respects as the original IBM.
Documentation
The system documentation was sup¬
plied in ring-bound A5 folders. I re¬
ceived a wide range of documentation
ranging from pre-release to final pack¬
aged versions. In the final versions the
folders are housed in see-through
plastic boxes.
Back of the machine: fan , printer port, RS232 port and slots for expansion cards
The information in the manuals was
well presented and well laid out with no
pretensions towards being tutorials.
They presented the information clearly
but without the 'now press button A'
approach.
Prices
The Olivetti M24 is competing head
on with the IBM PC for a si ice of the mass
market. A typical system with 128k of
RAM, twin disks and monochrome
screen will set you back £1939, which is
cheaper than a comparable IBM. A
colour monitor will cost you an extra
£629.
MADl
Hardware
The MADl is imported into this country
by MBS Microtex in Eton, and its most
obvious selling feature is its looks. The
system comprises four boxes: display,
keyboard, disk drives/power supply
unit and the main systems unit; and is
constructed of high impact plastic with
thetwo main units finished in darkgrey,
the keyboard in light grey and the
display in off-white — a striking com¬
bination.
MBS Microtex is selling this machine
as 'the BMW of the micro industry'. The
company is hoping that businesses will
buy IBM PCs for the workers but that the
boss will want something different— a
MADl, preferably.
Due to the disk drives/power supply
Technical specifications: Olivetti M24
CPU:
Intel 8086 running at8MHz
RAM:
128k (up to 256kon board)
Disks:
Twin IBM-compatible370k(optional harddisk)
Keyboard:
IBM or Olivetti layout
Display:
Monochrome or colour, 80x25 line
I/O:
RS232, parallel printer
Operating system:
MS-DOS2.11,PC-DOS
and the main systems unit being
housed in different boxes, the indi¬
vidual units can be kept very small.
They both measure only 12.5in wide by
15.5in deep by 2.5in high. If you stack
them on top of each other you have a
system which takes up very little desk
space, or if you place them side by side
you have a very low profile unit.
Setting up the machine is not as easy
as the Olivetti. As the main electrics are
housed in two boxes rather than one,
you need to hook up no less than four
cables to hold the whole system
together. All the different system ports
are different shapes, so there's no
danger of putting the wrong cable in the
wrong hole. The only probl^rwJs that
the printer port and the RS232 ports all
use exactly the same size 'D' plug but
they aren't marked. This is a silly
omission.
The front of the power supply/disk
drive unit houses a green LED on/off
indicator and twin Shugart half-height
5V4in IBM-compatible floppy disk
drives. The rear panel houses an
illuminated on/off switch, mains input,
two power sockets, a 'D' connector for
all the disk control lines and a reset
switch.
The front of the systems unit is blank
except for another green LED on/off
indicator. The story is different at the
back where there are interfaces for disk,
modem, video out, power in, Centro¬
nics printer port and two RS232 serial
ports, one of which can be configured
as a RS422 port.
All these ports are operational except
for the modem which is American and
illegal in the UK. Three more ports are to
befound underneath the main unit: the
first is a BT-style plug for the keyboard;
the second is a light pen interface; and
the third is a system expansion inter¬
face which is hidden away under a
blanking plate.
Getting inside both the system unit
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BENCHTEST
and the disk/power unit is
straightforward task: you
simply slacken two screws and
lift off the lid. The quality of con¬
struction of both units was very high
indeed. The casings come apart easily
and most are held together with Allen
screws rather than the more usual
crossheads.
Once inside the systems unit you are
confronted by two main PCBs. The
main PCB takes up most of the bottom
of the box; above that sits the video
controller card which takes up about
halfthe box. Both boards were very well
made. Again this was an early machine
so there were one or two patches, but
nowhere near as many as on the
Olivetti.
The most striking feature of the main
PCB isa largesilverchipaboutoneinch
square with connections running along
all four sides. This is an Intel 80186
central processor chip. This is the first
mass production micro I have seen
which makes use of the 80186 chip.
Despite having been available in low
volume for quite some time, it has had
more than its fair share of teething
troubles and is only now beginning to
be available in anything approaching
mass volume.
The 80186 contains an 8086 proces¬
sor, an interrupt controller, two DMA
channels, three 16-bit timer counters
and a bus controller all on one chip.
Incorporating all these functions on one
chip allows designers to use far fewer
supportchips and so reducethe overall
chip count within the system.
A large part of the PCB is taken up with
sockets for RAM chips. The sockets are
laid out in four banks of 18 chips which,
assuming you are using 64k chips, adds
up to a theoretical total of 512k with
parity on the main board. The review
machine was supplied with 256k of
RAM in place with the remaining
sockets free.
The main board also has provision for
the user to plug in one IBM expansion
card. If you need more than one extra
card then you'll have to use the
expansion module which can take four
more (MBS makes no guarantees that
theMADI will run all IBM cards, so it'sa
question of trial and error).
The video board comes with colour
capability as standard, so there is no
need to buy an extra colour
>oard. The only trouble is that MBS
wasn't happy with the MAD colour
monitor which is now being re¬
designed in the US.
The disk drives are standard 360k
5V4in IBM-compatible; the system is
also available with a 10Mbyte half¬
height hard disk. Unfortunately, the
controller card takes up the spare IBM
slot, so buying the expansion module is
a necessity if you want to run extra IBM
cards.
The MAD1 is supplied with either an
amber or a green display unit. The
review machine's was amber. I'm not a
great fan of amber displays — they
always look slightly out of focus. This
was certainly the case on the review
monitor, with the bottom left-hand
corner of the screen being the worst
offender.
Both the amber and green screens
have gauze anit-glare cloth glued to the
front of the screen, which in my opinion
is still the best method of cutting glare.
The only problem is that it can be
difficult to keep the surface clean.
The swivel display sits on top of the
main unit. Tilting is taken care of by
pressing a button on the back which
makes a leg shoot down to hold the
display at the desired angle.
The keyboard is the one area where
the MAD1 makes a major departure
from the IBM standard. Instead of
cramming all the keys together in one
line, the MAD1 has its function keys
running along the top of the keyboard;
and the separation of the numeric
keypad from the main typing area
makes the keyboard much less
cramped.
Many ancillary keys in the main
typing section have been moved from
their position on the IBM keyboard. This
made life difficult at first as I re-adjusted
from the 'real' IBM keyboard on the
Olivetti.
An unusual feature these days is that
the keyboard has a built-in palm rest in
front of the keys (from the side this
makes the unit look just like a slab of
grey cheese). The drawback is that it
makes the unit much larger, but it does
make for much more comfortable
typing.
In use the keyboard is very good. The
keys have a very solid feel and emit a
Technical specifications: MAD1
CPU:
RAM:
Disks:
Keyboard:
Display:
I/O:
Operating system:
Intel80186
Upto512konboard
Twin 370k IBM-compatible, optional 10Mbyte hard
disk
85 keys, integrated palm rest
80x25 amber, green or colour green
Two xRS232, parallel printer, light pen
MS-DOS version two
Benchmarks: MAD1
BM1
BM2
BM3
BM4
BM5
BM6
BM7
BM8
Average
0.7
2.6
5.5
5.7
6.2
10.9
16.8
17.3
8.2
All timings in seconds. Fora full listing
of the Benchmark programs see
'Direct Access'.
reassuring 'click' when pressed. The 'F'
and 'J' keys have lumps moulded onto
their tops to make them easier for
touch-typists to locate. The only thing I
didn't like about the keyboard is that the
NUM LOCK key is located next to the
RETURN key. Time after time I unwit¬
tingly hit the wrong key and only
realised when I hit DELETE and ended
up with a load of full stops ...
Although I prefer this keyboard lay¬
out to the standard IBM offering, it will
cause problems to people running IBM
programs who'll find that their friendly
keyboard overlays don't match the
keys. I suppose this is the price you pay
for having a better keyboard.
System software
The system is shipped with its own
version of MS-DOS version 2 called
MAD MS-DOS. Unlike the Olivetti the
MAD1 doesn't like running standard
PC-DOS. Although it will boot,forsome
reason it refuses to admit that disk B:
exists. This is as good a way as any of
crashing applications programs. If you
boot up under MAD MS-DOS the sytem
is much happier, although all is still not
sweetness and light.
The first problem I encountered was
thatthe MODE 40 command underDOS
didn't work. Instead of producing large
characters it produced a speckled effect
on the monitor — very pretty but not
much use.
Once or twice the sytem also gener¬
ated unrecoverable system errors. The
main symptom was an unintelligible
error message flashing across the
screen at great speed. The only obvious
way out was to re-boot the system.
All in all, the system software had too
many rough edges for my liking.
However, it must be remembered that I
had a very early version (I hope these
problems have been cleared up by the
time the system is available in volume).
Applications software
As long as you remember to boot up
under MAD MS-DOS rather than PC-
DOS, the MAD1 will run the majority of
IBM PC software. The fact that it isn't
happy running PC-DOS marks it out as
being notquiteasPC-compatibleasthe
172 PCW
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4 Low profile keyboard
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174PCW
BENCHTEST
Olivetti, so it would be a
good idea to try your software*
before you buy.
The MAD1 wasn't supplied with
Basic, but it was quite happy to run the
Olivetti version of GWBASIC, so the
Benchmarks were run using that; the
timings show that the MAD1 is slightly
slower than the Olivetti. Due to timing
problems the processor in the MAD1
was clocked at 6MHz rather than the
Olivetti's 8MHz.
Documentation
The documentation for the MAD1 was
supplied in two A5 boxed ring-binders,
and incorporated a user guide and a
MAD MS-DOS guide. Both manuals are
very striking to look at: predominantly
black with purple and yellow triangles,
circles and lines everywhere.
The manuals'text is fairly standard —
it tells you what you need to know
without any unnecessary frills.
Prices
The MAD1 is pitched at the high end of
the market, therefore it has a correspon¬
dingly high price.
The basic monochrome system with
screen, keyboard, 128k of RAM and twin
disks costs £2785. The top-end machine
with a 10Mbyte hard disk costs £4995.
Conclusion
There is no arguing with thefactthatthe
MAD1 is overpriced, but then MBS
Both units are well supplied with ports: but the modem interface is illegal in the UK
makes it very clear that it's hoping to sell
the machine to people who are more
interested in their professional status
and image than the brass tacks of
pounds and pence.
When you operate on the idea that it's
image that counts, then the MAD1
succeeds in its aims.
The machine looks very pretty and
has sufficient compatibility with the
IBM PC to allow the boss to use his
minions' disks.
In order to compete effectively with
the IBM PC in the mass market, a clone
caneithercompeteon price,features or
both.
The Olivetti machine offers signifi¬
cantly higher performance than the IBM
PC at a slightly lower price. With the
exception of BASICA itcompetently ran
all the PC software that I tried with no
noticeable problems.
The Olivetti is the best IBM PC clone
that I have come across so far. It runs
visibly faster, looks nicer and has a
much better display than the PC. If I
were in the market for an IBM PC-type
machine, I would give the Olivetti a very
close look indeed.
i ■ > ri- i: r
■ -
! r 1 E r rTTTT it n ; i ! ift
A majordeparture from the IBM standard: function keys are well dear of the main typing area
PC W175
Nowthat Wimbledoti's devoid of strawberries and the last tarrtrurn has been thrown,
wqu[dr['t you like toplayon tjie Centre Court, kick with BruceLee ordestroy
enemyfqrve^qin a war-torn beach? Jony^SuperbratdHetl^^ keeps his
eye fjjrnjyoii tjiebestofthe newreleases forthe Spectnjm 1 Atar[and^ Commodore 64.
‘You cannot be
serious...’
Title: Match Point
Computer: 48k Spectrum
Supplier: Sinclair(Psion)
Format: Cassette
Price: £7.95
Quiet, please. Spectrum to serve, love
all, first set. The Spectrum serves an ace
and the crowd gasps. It serves another
ace then another and another, and
you're left with the consolation thatthe
game will only last three sets.
It's also possible to lose to human
opponents in this exceptional tennis
game which more than captures the
atmosphere of the Centre Court. You'll
be impressed by the smooth graphics
and the amount of skill required to keep
from losing in straight sets. With a
subtle turn of the joystick you can spin
the ball or perhaps lob or smash it. If
you're exceptionally dexterous then
you may be able to use the keyboard
controls, but for mere mortals both
Sinclair and Kempston interfaces are
supported.
The screen display is the view of the
court from the commentary box, and
comes complete with umpire's chair
and ball boys who look like refugees
from Quicksilva's Ant Attack.
Match Point can be played at three
different speeds or skill levels ranging
from quarter final (slow) to final (fast). I
prefer the 'semi-final' level as it allows
both ball speeds which makes for a
more interesting game.
One thing I find puzzling is that while I
hate tennis and detest Wimbledon, I like
Match Point. It will probably become
one of the Spectrum classics and join
the ranks of the Hobbit and Atic Atac as
essential buys for Spectrum owners.
Now that Wimbledon is thankfully dead
and forgotten for another year you'll be
ableto get nearthetelevision to play it.
It's game, set and match to Psion.
HongKongfuey
Title: Bruce Lee
Computer: Atari
Supplier: US Gold/Datasoft
Format: Disk
Price. £14.95
Take a well-known character, build a
game around him and you've got a
guaranteed winner. That's the theory
behind this game based on the legen¬
dary Kung Fu expert Bruce Lee.
The format's quite simple: it's a maze
game in which you must collect objects
in order to work through rooms to¬
wards a final battle with a fireball-
flinging wizard.
This format fits the Bruce Lee image
well as he leaps, chops and kicks
through all that is placed before him. In
reality you must steer Bruce through
the rooms avoiding traps set for you
and battling with the Ninja and the
dreaded Green Yamo. These fights can
become quite complicated as you run
and jump in an attempt to land the killer
blow. Unfortunately they have similar
ideas, so you should be prepared to
duck out of the way and run if neces¬
sary.
I found these fights to be the best part
ofthegameand spent most ofthetime
grappling with the Yamo. It seems I'm
not alone in this, as one of the options
available is a two player game which is a
duel between Bruce and the Yamo with
10 falls deciding the match.
For those who prefer exploring
chambers there are 20 to find, but
however you choose to play the
game you'll be impressed with the
graphics.
Bruce Lee is produced by the Amer¬
ican company Datasoft and imported
into the UK by US Gold. You should be
able to buy it from your local shop so
watch out for more American software
via US Gold.
176PCW
Keeping a good thing
going
Title: Sabre Wulf
Computer: 48k Spectrum
Supplier: Ultimate
Format: Cassette
Price: £9.95
Ultimate is arguably king of the Spec¬
trum arcade games and so it was
understandable that the world and his
joystick waited with bated breath forthe
sequel to Atic Atac. This is it.
Although it's streets ahead of the
usual rubbish pushed out for joystick
junkies I was curiously disappointed
with it, as it seems little more than Atic
Atac part two.
Sabre Wulf is described as a graphics
adventure but is really no more than
another scenario for Atic Atac. It's just
as good and enjoyable to play but lacks
the innovation.
This time you're trapped in a forest
maze; before you can escape you mu$t
collect four parts of an amulet while
avoiding the many perils that rush
around the screen making strange
Ultimate-style warbling noises. These
perils come in many shapes and sizes
including hippos, rhinos, snakes, wart
hogs and tarantulas, all of which think
you're the meal they've been waiting
for.
You find food, water and supplies to
help you in your quest, but beware of
the strange orchids that bloom in the
forest. You have to be very careful in
stepping on these for they flower only
for a few seconds and in a variety of
colours; each colour has a different
effect, from giving you high energy to
death.
Treasure also abounds in the forest
which naturally scores you points, but
the main objective of your quest is to
find the amulet. This quest will no doubt
bring you into contact with the Wulves
— horrendous creatures which will kill
all but the very best.
Sabre Wulf contains all of Ultimate's
trademarks — superb graphics, fast
action and even a tune before the game
starts.
Labour of love
Title: Hercules
Computer: Commodore 64
Supplier: Interdisc
Format: Cassette
Price: £6.95
Hercules is a platform game in the now
familiar Manic Miner style but taken to
its limits.
To complete the 12 labours of Her¬
cules you must solve 50 screens. These
screens are allocated to each of the
labours and success in one screen leads
to the next. Completion of every screen
inthefirst 11 labours istheonly routeto
the twelfth and final labour.
To complete a screen successfully
you must get Hercules from the start
position to the doorway of the next
screen.
Unfortunately it's not that simple, as
you have to cope with disappearing
platforms, breaking ropes and critters
out to get you. You don't have much
time to plan your moves as it's quite
likely that the platform ygu are standing
on will burst into flames losing you one
of your three lives.
Trial and error is the name of the
game until you've been through many
levels (and lives), at which time you
may begin to anticipate what will
happen. A suicidal urge may also be of
assistance, as on several levels the only
course of action open to you is to leap
intooblivion inthehopethata platform
will appear to break your fall.
One interesting feature ofthegameis
that you tackle the labours in a random
order so that you don't get stuck in one
place — you get stuck in several places
instead.
Interdisc is a record company better
known for its work with Sting and the
Human League, and this is its first
computer game.
I shall be looking forward to the next
game if this is anything to go by.
‘We'll fight them on tbe
beaches...’
Title: Beach-head
Computer: Commodore 64
Supplier: US Gold/Access
Format : Disk or cassette
Price: £9.95
Beach-head is a multi-level arcade war
game which will stretch your abilities to
the limit. To succeed in your mission to
destroy the fortress of Kuhn Lin, you
must survive four levels and retain
sufficient forces to proceed to the
next.
The first stage is optional but recom¬
mended as it cuts down the number of
aircraft that attack you in the second
stage. All you have to do is steer your
fleet of nine ships through a cavern
littered with mines and torpedoes. The
surviving ships are then attacked by
aircraft which you must shoot down
before they inflict too much damage.
The enemy ships then open fire and
you're thrown into a duel where the
survivor is the one to fire first at the
correct elevation. The elevation is
controlled with the joystick and a
message reporting the result of the shot
appears at the bottom of the screen.
The favoured few ships that survive
this onslaught will land two tanks on the
beach. They must advance one by one
up to the fortress negotiating enemy
tanks and gun positions en route. To
win the game you must destroy 12
targets on the fortress butyou'll do well
to take out three targets with one tank.
Subsequent tanks have a harder jour¬
ney up the beach, so the game should
keep its appeal for some time.
The screenshots illustrate the game's
graphics but you'll have to play it to
sample the superb sound effects.
PCW177
SPECTRUM
Programming
Spectrum
function keys
Smgje key entry of Basic keywords is an innovative featureoftheZ)( Spectrum,
buthowaboijt^rogj^mmmg keys to executieawhole IjneofBasic?
Oneoftheadvantagesofthe BBC Micro
over the Spectrum is its provision of
programmable function keys. Prog¬
rammed function keys are a great saver
of both time and space. Used in
foreground mode, such keys allow you
to develop and debug programs faster.
Function keys also offerthe opportunity
to make your program menus request
function key depression for invoking a
menu item.
The routines offered here allow
Spectrum users to create commands
and assign them to function keys. The
example given allows up to 10 keys to
be delivered as holding a Basic line;
when one is pressed that line is
executed.
All function key assignment com¬
mands are preceded by an asterisk. For
example, to define one of the keys the
following would be input in direct
mode:
*key0 <enter> PRINT "HELLO"
<enter>
Once you've typed this in, whenever
you press key 0 (the key with the '8'on it)
in graphics mode, the program will run
and the word'HELLO'will appear on the
screen. Obviously more complex prog¬
rams can be defined butthey must only
take up one line. In this article an
example command to produce a tone
through the speaker is given, called by
'*RASP'.
The keys defined here are the first 10
graphics keys (top row), so the use of
the graphics symbols on these keys is
lost.
10 CLS
20 INPUT "Enter decimal starting address?";a
30 INPUT "Enter two digit hex number?";H$
40 X=0
50 FOR B = 1 TO 2
60 P=CODE(MID$(H$,B,1 ))-48
70 IF P>9 THEN P=P-7
80 IF B = 1 THEN P=P*16
90 X=X+P
100 NEXT B
110 POKE A,X
115 PRINT H$;" hex=";X;" decimal at address";A
120 A=A+1
130 GOTO 30
Fig 1 Basic hex loader progam
VECTOR:
EQU
65279
interrupt vector address
LASTK:
EQU
23560
;Value of last pushed
ELINE:
EQU
23641
; Address of edit buffer
KSTATE:
EQU
23552
;Key status
WORKSP:
EQU
23649
;End of edit buffer
RAMTOP:
EQU
23730
;Top of memory
ERRSP:
EQU
23613
;Error stack
KCUR:
EQU
23643
;Cursor address
ORG
50000
;Start of program
215FC3
LD
HL,START
;HL=start of ISR
22FFFE
LD
(VECTOR), HL
;Set up the vector
F3
Dl
3EFE
LD
A,254
;A=MSBof ISR
ED47
LD
LA
;Set up the ISR
ED5E
IM
2
;Mode 2 interrupts
FB
El
C9
RET
;Return to ROM
Fig 2 Code to set up the ISR
178 PC W
One of the Spectrum's best features
is its interrupt structure. The 'INT' line
on the Spectrum's central processor
(Z80A) is madeactive 50timesa second
(that is, a square wave of period 20mS).
Normally (on power up) the Spectrum
operates in mode 1 interrupts where
each time the 'INT' line is active, control
is passed to a routine at 0038 hex in the
ROM. This routine updates the
(pseudo) real-time clock and scans the
keyboard. However, realising that un¬
connected peripherals leave the data
bus floating at OFF hex during an
F3FF START:
DI,RST
56
:Disable any interrupts
E5
PUSH
HL
;Save registers
D5
PUSH
DE
C5
PUSH
BC
F5
PUSH
AF
FDCB016E
BIT
5,(1 Y H-1)
;Check keyboard
284A
JR
Z,ENDR
;lf none pushed then exit
3A085C
LD
AJLASTK)
;A=last key pushed
FE80
CP
128
;Check for graphics characters
3805
JR
C,NOPE
FE8A
CP
138
DA13C4
JP
C,RUN
;'Run' the key code
FE0D NOPE:
CP
13
;'ENTER'?
203A
JR
NZ,ENDR
; Exit if not.
2A595C
LD
HL(ELINE)
;HL=input buffer start
7E
LD
A,(HL)
;A=first character
FE2A
CP
;ls it a new command?
2032
JR
NZ,ENDR
;Exit if not
Fig 3 ISR start-up code
1166C4
LD
DE,LIST
;DE=start of new cmd table
23
INC
HL
1A
SEARCH:
LD
A,(DE)
;A=character in table
B7
OR
A
;End of command?
2821
JR
Z,FOUND
47
LD
B,A
;B=character in table
7E
LD
A,(HL)
;A=character in buffer
FE0D
CP
13
;End of line?
2824
JR
Z,ENDR
;Exit if so
B8
CP
B
;Are they the same?
2004
JR
NZ,ENTRY
;lf not then jump
13
INC
DE
23
INC
HL
;Bump pointers
18EF
JR
SEARCH
;Loop until the end.
13
ENTRY:
INC
DE
1A
LD
A,(DE)
;Check for next word
B7
OR
A
2806
JR
Z,ENT1
FEFF
CP
255
;End of command list
2814
JR
Z,ENDR
;lf so then exit
18F5
JR
ENTRY
;Keep looking!
13
ENT1:
INC
DE
;Point to next
13
INC
DE
13
INC
DE
2A595C
LD
HLJELINE)
;Start of buffer-}-1
23
INC
HL
18DB
JR
SEARCH
44
FOUND:
LD
B,H
;BC = position in buffer
4D
LD
C,L
13
INC
DE
1A
LD
A,(DE)
;A=LSB of routine address
6F
LD
L,A
13
INC
DE
1A
LD
A,(DE)
;A=MSB of routine address
67
LD
H,A
;HL=routine address
E9
JP
(HL)
;Execute routine
Fig 4 Search for command code
FI ENDR:
POP
AF
;Restore registers
Cl
POP
BC
D1
POP
DE
El
POP
HL
FB
ED4D
Fig 5 End of the ISR
El
RETI
;Enable the interrupts
interrupt sequence, we can program
the Z80 in mode 2 interrupts. In this
mode the Z80 combines the 'I' register
and the value of the data bus to form a
16-bit vector address (that is T OFF
hex). If, at this vector address, an
address of our new interrupt service
routine (ISR) is stored, this will be
executed every 20mS instead of the
Sinclair routine.
Each of the programs published here
contains an assembly-type listing with
the hex code, mnemonics and com¬
ments (like a typical 'sub set' program).
You must type all the hex code into the
Spectrum using the Basic hex loader
program in Fig 1. The program will
allow you to enter the hex digits (two at
a time) into the Spectrum's memory.
The program is very simple but for a
more suitable loader, refer to PCW,
May, page 186 or use any other hex
loader program you may have. The hex
must be typed in two digits at a time
(this is called a byte or word of data).
The start or origin of the code is 50000
(decimal), C350 (hexadecimal).
The piece of code in Fig 2 will set up
the ISR as previously explained (any
hex which appears must be typed into
the Spectrum).
The ISR start-up code in Fig 3 scans
the keyboard (to stop the system
'locking up'), saves any registers and
checks the input buffer. If you press the
'ENTER' button this signals that the
input buffer has been filled. The routine
will check to see if it's a new command
(that is, starts with a '*') or if it's one of
‘Programmed function
keys area grea t saver of
bothtimeandspace...
such keysallowyou to
develop and debug
programs faster. (They)
also offer the opportunity
to make program menus
request function key
depression for invoking a
menujte m. *
the newly defined keys (graphics keys
of value 128-138).
The search for command code in Fig 4
will search a table for the new 'star'
command. If it's found the address of
the new command routine is taken from
the table and jumped to (that is, the new
routine is executed).
The ISR will terminate if no new
command has been recognised. The
piece of code in Fig 5 will return the
registers to their normal values and
enablethe interrupts and return control
to the ROM. If a command has been
recognised, the ISR does not exit
through this routine.
The piece of code in Fig 6 will add a
simple new command to the Spectrum.
It is called by '*RASP<enter>' and will
play a note through the speaker. If you
PCW 179
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SPECTRUM
110501 RASP:
LD
DE,261
;Parameters for BEEP
216A06
LD
HL,1642
CDB503
CALL
949
;Make the note
2A595C
LD
HL,(ELINE)
;Start of input buffer
360D
LD
(HL),13
;Signal it is empty
C3B5C3
JP
ENDR
;Exit routine
Fig 6 Sample new command
0AD630CD51C4FDCB01 AE3E FF32005CCD BO 16CD2C0FED5B595CD52A
61 5CED52444D2A74C47E B72808B93005CD41 C4CF0F71 23 70 23D1 EB
ED BO 2A76C4 23 73 23 72 CD 41 C4FBC3A2 12
Fig 7 Hex dumpcode for user-defined function keys
D6 80 CD 51 C4 3E FF 32 00 5C FD CB 01 AE CD BO 16 2A 74 C44E 2346 23 E5 C5 2A
5B5CCD5516C1 El ED5B595CED BO CD 41 C4C3B4122AB2 5C2B223D5CD1
F93603 23 36 13 EB E9 11 78 C417 6F 2600 197E 5F 23 22 76C47E 57 ED 53 74C4
C9
Fig 8 Code to execute the stored Basic line
72617370 RASP:
DEFB
'rasp'
;New command
00
DEFB
0
;End of command
BCC3
DEFW
RASP
;Address of command
6B6579
DEFB
'key'
;New command
00
DEFB
0
CDC3
DEFW
KEY
;Address of routine
FF
DEFW
255
;End of table
The following code is simply storage space and pointers. You musttypethehex
in as it is shown.
0000 STORE:
DEFS
2
0000 POINT:
DEFS
2
84C4 TABS:
DEFW
MEMORY
0000000000
DEFS
5
0000000000
DEFS
5
00 MEMORY: EQU
END
Fig 9 Command table
$
wish to add further commands you can
follow this example making sure you
make an entry in the table ('LIST') for
each new command you need; you will
need an assembler to do this.
The code for user-defined function
keys will be executed when the user
types the command *KEYn where n is
the key number in the range 0-9. The
routine will convert the key number into
hex and find the particular pointer to
this key. You then type in the Basic line
the key is to represent and press
'ENTER'. The routine saves this line,
ready to be recalled when a graphics
key is pushed.
The code in Fig 7 follows on from the
previous code but has been given in the
form of a hex dump as it is rather long.
Thegraphicskeyscan be redefined in
order to hold a Basic line. When the key
is pushed this line will be executed. The
following keys can be defined:
8
.keyO
5.
.key5
1 .
.keyl
6.
.key 6
2.
7.
.key7
3.
8.
.key 8
4.
9.
.key 9
These keys are
on the top
row of the
keyboard and SHIFT+GRAPHICS must
be pressed first to select graphics
mode. The keys can only be defined in
order but may be redefined as long as
the new definition is not longer than the
previous one. For example:
You type: *key0<enter>
FOR 1 = 1 TO 10:PRINT l:NEXT I
<enter>
Now you have defined graphics key 0
(key '8' on the keyboard) as holding this
set of statements, to execute it you
simply press SHIFT+GRAPHICS and
then the key with number '8' on it.You
can then define key 2,3, and so on, in
that order. You cannot define key 4 and
then key 0; they must be defined in
order since in defining each one you are
creating a pointer for the next key (like a
linked list).
The code in Fig 8 will execute the
Basic line stored as each key is defined.
The command table in Fig 9 searches
fora new command. If you re-assemble
the code you can add your own
commands by inserting their name and
address in this table.
Running the program
When the hex code from Fig 9 has been
entered, save the code by typing SAVE
'keys' CODE 50000,304 <enter>; once
this has been done (and checked) type
RANDOMIZE USR 50000. You will see
no effect except that the screen is
cleared. Nowtype *RASP<enter>: the
Spectrum will not give you the normal
syntax error of a question mark but will
emit a tone on the speaker. You have
just added an extra command to the
Spectrum!
I havefoundthefollowing definitions
very useful:
*key0 <enter> PRINT INVERSE 1;
"FREE MEMORY:";65536-USR 7962
This will define the '8' key in graphics
mode to display the number of bytes
left to the user at any time.
*key1 <enter> LOAD LIST
<enter>
If you have an assembler on the
Spectrum then you can assemble the
mnemonics given and create your own
commands.
For example:
^RENUMBER, *FIND or ^REPLACE.
im
PCW181
LANGUAGES
D
TEACH
OURSELF
Dick Fountain's 'Teach Yourseif^seriescontinues with a definition
ofnewfi^nc^nsajT^examples^fproperjJsppmgrar^
Lispworkson names, numbersand lists
by applying functions to them; a
function isapplied by making itthefirst
element of a list, the rest of which
contains its arguments. Functions al¬
ways return values (so far we have
looked at CAR, CDR and CONS) but Lisp
systems include many otherfunctions;
typical microcomputer versions will
have between 60 and 100 built-in
functions. You'll find a list of these in the
supplied system manual, along with
descriptions of what they do and how
they treat their arguments. One func¬
tion that's always included is OBLIST,
which returnsa list of all the objects Lisp
knows about in the order in which they
were created. It will list on the screen
any names that you have created
during the session and the names of all
the built-in functions.
PLUS, DIFFERENCE and TIMES are
always provided to do arithmetic (in
some systems they can take more than
two arguments so (PLUS 1234) returns
10). Division is more variable between
systems. No home computer imple¬
mentation of Lisp that I know of has
floating point arithmetic; most have
signed 16-bit integer maths, which can
cope with numbers between -32768
and 32767 (the notable exception is
Microsoft's muLISP which, like most
mainframe versions, has 'infinite' pre¬
cision integer arithmetic so you can
deal with any number whose repre¬
sentation will fit into free RAM). Most
micro Lisps provide QUOTIENT and
REMAINDER for integer division and
some have DIVIDE which returns both
quotient and remainder. Lisp is not
geared to lots of number crunching: if
that's what you need a good Basic will
serve you better.
Another important group of func¬
tions perform tests. They return a value
which is either True or False, just like
do in Basic. However, the
representation of True or False in Lisp is
not 1 or 0 as in most other languages:
instead they have their own special
names, T and NIL. These two words are
built into the system and if you type
them in at the keyboard they evaluate to
themselves, just as a number does. It's
important not to confuse NIL with
arithmetic 0, though. It does represent
nothing, but a different sort of nothing
(no prizes for guessing that it repre-
sentsthe empty list (), as you'll see if you
type in ()).
Typical tests include:
(NUMBERPX)
(ATOMX)
(NULLX)
(ZEROPX)
(EQUALXY)
(GREATERPXY)
- isXanumber?
- isXanatom?
- isXNIL?
- isXzero?
- areXandYthe
same?
- isX
numerically
greaterthan Y?
(MEMBERXY) — isXamember
of the list Y?
The P which often ends these names
is one of the historic relics that litter
Lisp, standing for 'predicate' (a ques¬
tion mark at the end of all test names
would have been better but I don't think
they had them in those days). You've
probably realised by now that some of
these tests are sensitive to the type of
their arguments: for example,
GREATERP must have numbers not
lists. This is the price we pay for letting a
name take values of any type but it's
well worth it. Check how your system
behaves if you give it the wrong types;
some give error messages while others
just return NIL. Try this:
* (SETQ FRED 4)
* (SETQ TOM'(1 2 3))
* (GREATERP TOM FRED)
(Throughout this article I'm going to
show in the examples exactly what
you'd see on the screen. * istheprompt
and Lisp's replies will appear on the
next line at the left margin).
If all that Lisp could do were evaluate
its built-in functions in this way, it would
be a rather boring type of (integer only!)
desk calculator. But, of course, we can
define our own functions: defining
functions is programming in Lisp. In
order for our functions to do all the
things that a Basic or Pascal program
can (and more), they'll need to be more
complex than the ones we've seen so
far: they must be able to branch and
loop and choose just as GOTO, FOR ...
NEXT and IF do. But for now let's just
settle for defining something simple.
The function that defines functions in
Lisp has various names in different
systems but it's usually one of DEFINE,
DEF, DE or DEFUN (DEFine FUNction).
I'll stickto DEFINE because it says what
it does.
DEFINE takes three arguments, so:
(DEFINE function-name (list of its argu¬
ments) (body of function)) where the
'body' of the function is just what you
would type in if you wanted to do what
the function is supposed to do. As an
example let's define SQUARE to calcu¬
late the square of a number. To square
nine, using what we know so far, we
type:
* (TIMES 9 9)
81
In our SQUARE function we want to
replace the specific number nine with a
variable argument, which we'll call
NUM.So:
* (DEFINE SQUARE (NUM)
(TIMES NUM NUM) )
SQUARE
does the trick. Notice the value
'SQUARE'which Lisp returned. DEFINE
is, after all, only anotherfunction and it
must return a value, which is always the
name of the function we've just defined.
We use SQUARE just like any other
function :
* (SQUARE 8)
64
Two points are worthy of comment;
the first is that we didn't need to use any
quotes in the definition: DEFINE is one
of that rare breed of functions that
doesn't evaluate any of its arguments.
The second is that the variable which
represents SQUARE'S argument
(namely NUM) is given to DEFINE as a
list (that is, in brackets). This is nothing
to do with the type of NUM (in this case
it's a number not a list), but is the way
182PCW
DEFINE wants its second argument and
who are we to argue. The reason
becomes obvious when you define a
function which takes more than one
argument.
People whose only programming
language is Basic may not be comfort¬
able with the fact that SQUARE'S
argument is called NUM when we
define it, but we don't need to use NUM
whenweuseit. ForexampleJfweSETQ
FRED to 4, then:
* (SQUARE FRED)
16
NUM is a 'formal' parameter or
argument (they're used in Pascal and
many other languages too). It's there
just as a place holder in the definition, to
mean 'whatever value is given to
SQUARE'. Wheneveryou call SQUARE,
you can think of its argument (8 or FRED
in the above examples) as being
automatically decanted into NUM. This
decanting process (called 'variable
binding') is rather special in Lisp.
SQUARE is now just as good as any of
the built-in Lisp functions; you'll see it
on the CBLIST if you wish. There are no
second-class citizens in Lisp (many of
the built-in functions are defined in
machine code, some in Lisp like
SQUARE, but you can't tell the differ¬
ence).
Let's define a function which takes
the first element from each of two lists
and tells us whether they're the same:
* (DEFINE SAME-FIRST-ELEMENT?
(LIST1 LIST2)
(EQUAL (CAR LIST1) (CAR LIST2)) )
SAME-FIRST-ELEMENT?
We can use the function thus:
* (SAME-FIRST-ELEMENT? '(1 2 3)
'(1 EGG 2 PIGS))
T
or:
* (SAME-FIRST-ELEMENT? '(1 2 3)
'(A B C))
NIL
Note SAME-FIRST-ELEMENT? is a
normal, respectable Lisp function and
evaluates its arguments, hence the
quotes before the lists. This is true of all
functions created with DEFINE.
Note again that the brackets around
(LIST1 LIST2)arethere because it'sa list
of the formal arguments, not because
LIST1 and LIST2 represent lists. Satisfy
yourself that you understand why the
brackets are as they are in (EQUAL (CAR
LIST1) (CAR LIST2)). It's exactly what
you'd type at the keyboard to do the
test, assuming that LIST 1 and LIST2 had
been given values with SETQ.
Finally, note that Lisp doesn't mind a
definition running over more than one
line. When you hit RETURN Lisp won't
accept the definition until all the brack¬
ets are balanced, which means that it's
finished. Note also the extra spaces
before the last bracket (which matches
the one before DEFINE and ends the
definition). This makes the structure of
the EQUAL clause easier to see than if it
had three right brackets at the end. If
you're not to be driven batty by the
brackets in Lisp (it's rumoured to stand
for Lots of Irritating Single Parentheses)
then pay attention to the layout of your
definitions, breaking them at natural
places onto a new line.
This raises a further point: how do
you edit Lisp definitions? There is no
simple answer. The Lisp interpreter
normally allows only the use of the
BACKSPACE/DELETE to undo things
typed on the current line. Some home
computer implementations (for exam¬
ple, on the BBC and Spectrum) might
allow you to use the built-in editor
which works for Basic programs. Other¬
wise a separate editing program is
required and very often one, written in
Lisp, will be supplied as a separate file
which you can load. Lisp peopletendto
be spartan, almost monastic souls
unspoiled by full-screen editors, so
don't expect it to look like WordStar.
Now that we can define functions, all
that's lacking in order to write real
programs is some means of directing
control flow.
This is a rather controversial area
among Lisp people. The original 'pure'
form of Lisp relied entirely on a function
called COND (for 'CONDition') to alter
the course of evaluation. Various other
control structures have been tried,
mostly modelled on those in more
conventional languages: for example,
LOOP or WHILE. I'll only consider a pure
form of Lisp using COND here, partly
because COND is both powerful and
elegant once you grasp it but also
because the newer constructs tend to
vary from version to version.
COND is a function which chooses
between a number of lists (called
'clauses') which make up its argu¬
ments. Each clause has two parts: the
first element is a test expression which
returns T or NIL (sometimes called a
'predicate'), and the rest can be any
number of Lisp expressions :
(COND
(testl expressions....)
(test2 expressions ....)
(test3 expressions....)
(testN expressions....) )
COND performs the tests one at a
time starting from the top and when it
finds one that isn't NIL, evaluates the
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184 PC W
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WITH MOUSE
Microsoft Word is a completely new approach to microcomputer word processing.
Designed to be easy enough for a first time user, it is nevertheless one of the most powerful packages available today.
FEATURES
MOUSE CONTROLLED OPERATION
The Mouse makes text editing and command selection simpler and faster.
STYLESHEETS
Style sheets let you set up repeatedly used documents instantly.
You can store line spacing, typestyle positioning and page format, ready
to be recalled by two key strokes.
FORMATTING
Pages can be formatted on-screen to new column widths and page lengths.
A rule can be displayed at the top of the screen for easy and accurate
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All this plus a window facility makes Word with Mouse the modern approach to word processing.
EASY TO USE
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PRIFORTRAN
NS.
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PRO PASCAL:
In addition to the features of Standard Pascal, the Pro
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important for “real world” programming: dynamic strings
for character and text manipulation, long integers and
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single and double precision floating-point arithmetic for
scientific work, an assembler-level interface for system
programmers, a separate compilation of program
segments for building libraries of commonly-used
procedures allowing large object programs to be
constructed.
Pro Pascal is a 3-pass compiler, converting source
programs into relocatable machine-code form. The
operation of the compiler is easy to use, and a one line
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PRO FORTRAN:
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with a number of the features from the later Fortran 77.
It allows the programmer to use very fast REAL,
DOUBLE PRECISION and COMPLEX arithmetic and
functions.
It comprises of a 2-pass compiler with a number of compile-time options including storage map, overflow checks,
checks for non-standard features etc.
The Pro Fortran run-time library allows an execution speed and accuracy which are second to none amongst high level language implementations.
Floating-point formats are IEEE draft standard.
Pro Fortran’s linker accepts files in relocatable binary form. Large files can be produced because linking is disc-to-disc and paging techniques are used.
Both Pro Pascal and Pro Fortran have been developed in the UK. The packages include a compiler, linker, librarian, run-time library,
a source cross-referencer, and a utility to configure the software to suit variations, such as differing disc capacities.
By Prospero Software
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PC W185
LANGUAGES
(COND
NIL
L>(test1 —j expl exp2)
L*(test2 —| exp3 exp4
NIL
exp5)
T
L»(test3 —> exp6 —> exp7) —»
value of exp7
never
reached (test4 exp8 exp9
expIO) )
Fig 1 COND: tracing control flow
(DEFINE LOOK-FOR-EGG (LIST)
(COND
( (EQUAL (CAR LIST) 'EGG)
'FIRST! )
( (EQUAL (CAR(CDRLIST)) 'EGG)
'SECOND! )
( (EQUAL (CAR(CDR(CDR LIST))) 'EGG)
'THIRD! )
( T
)
'DUNNO! )
)
Fig 2 Function for the word 'EGG'
expressions that follow it. The value of
the /asf of these expressions is the value
returned by COND. If all the tests yield
NIL then COND just returns NIL.
It may help to understand COND
better if we stop thinking in Lisp
functional terms for a minute and
pretend we're in Basic. Tracing control
flow with your finger, as in a Basic
program, COND works down the col¬
umn of tests and when it finds a true one
carries on across and out (Fig 1).
The tests don't have to evaluate to T
— any value other than NIL will trigger
COND. If you want to make sure that
somef/7/ngalwaysgetsevaluated,then
the last clause can simply have T as its
test portion. If all the other tests fail, this
last clause will always be evaluated. It
wouldn't make sense to start any clause
before the last with T, because the
clauses below itcould never be reached
and would be redundant. The example
in Fig 2 may help to clarify this.
This preposterous function looks for
the word 'EGG' in a list and tells you
which position it's in,though itgivesup
after trying the first three! Artificial
intelligence written very small indeed:
*( LOOK-FOR-EGG ' (DOG EGG FISH
PIG))
SECOND!
You could read a COND like this as IF
...THEN... IF... THEN... IF... THEN...
OTHERWISE...., where the T clause is
the otherwise part which is always
executed by default.
Instead of the puny 'FIRST!,
'SECOND!, and so on, we could have
any number of expressions doing
processing of great complexity. Don't
forget that only the value of the last such
expression is returned; if there were
more than one, the others could only be
there for their side-effects as they can't
return any value. For example, if we
make this change :
(COND
( (EQUAL (CAR LIST) 'EGG)
(SETQ EGGPOSN 1) 'FIRST! )...
then the SETQ expression sets the
variable EGGPOSN to one as a side-
effect: that is, it contributes nothing to
the value returned by LOOK-FOR-EGG ,
which remains FIRST! if this clause is
chosen.
Don't be depressed by the sight
of that grisly progression of
CAR(CDR(CDRs (what if we wanted to
search the first 100 places?). That is not
a sensible way to do things in Lisp but
we haven't yet discovered the trick to do
it properly. A short term improvement
would be to use CADR and CADDR, but
what we really want is a means of
repeating the application of CAR (or any
other function) as many times as
necessary. IH3
Lisp discount
offer
To helpyougetthebestfrom the Teach Yourself Lisp series ,PCW has arranged special
discountson several Lisp packages. Identify your machinefromthe list belowand send
the offer tab at thecorner of this page with a chequeforthe full amount to the appropriate
address, stating clearly which machine it is for.
Machine
Spectrum
NewBrain
CP/M-80:
QX-10
Televideo
Kaypro
Sirius
SuperBrain
Apple II
Lynx Laureate
Transtec
Tatung PC2000
NEC 8000
Pied Piper
DRS-20
TAP3&PC
BBCB
IBM PC
Address
Serious Software
5 Wimbourne Avenue
Chislehurst
Kent BR7 6RQ
Software Ltd, f o r...
2 Alice Owen Centre
251 Goswell Rd
LondonEC1
OR
Text 100, for...
South Black Lion Lane
Hammersmith
London W6
Text 100
Address as above
Cheque (includes
VAT and p&p)
£10.50
(Normal price £15.50)
Supersoft Lisp: £75
(Normal price £115)
Microsoft MuLisp: £112
(Normal price £170)
MuLisp (Microsoft): £112
(Normal price £170)
LISP
DISCOUNT
VOUCHER
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DETAILS
Level 9 Computing specialise in
hugh, pure-text puzzle
adventures with detailed scenery
and a wealth of puzzles. All games
have over 200 locations and a
save game feature, and cost
£9.90 inclusive.
MIDDLE EARTH ADVENTURES
1:COLOSSAL ADVENTURE. A
complete, full size version of the
classic mainframe game
Adventure' with 70 bonus
locations added
2: ADVENTURE QUEST
Centuries have passed since the
time of Colossal Adventure and
evil armies roam The Land. With
cunning, you must overcome the
many obstacles on the road to the
Black Tower, source of their
demonic power, and destroy it.
3: DUNGEON ADVENTURE. The
trilogy is completed by this
massive adventure, set in the rich
caves below the shattered Black
Tower A sense of humour is
essential!
THE FIRST SILICON DREAM
ADVENTURE
4: SNOWBALL. The first of Pete
Austin s second trilogy The giant
colony starship, Snowball 9, has
been sabotaged and is heading
for the sun in this giant game with
7000 locations
THE LORDS OF TIME SAGA
7: LORDS OF TIME. Our
congratulations to Sue Gazzard
for her super design of this new
time travel adventure through the
ages of world history. Chill to the
Ice-age, go romin with Caesars
legions, shed light on the Dark
Ages etc. etc
LEVEL 9 ADVENTURES
BBC 32 K COMMODORE 64 SPECTRUM 48K
LYNX 48K NASCOM 32K ORIC 48k ATARI 32K
Level 9 adventures are available at £9.90 from good computer
shops, or mail order from us at no extra charge. Send order, or SAE
for catalogue, to the address below - and please describe your
micro.
LEVEL 9 COMPUTING
Dept
229 Hughenden Road, High Wycombe, Bucks HP13 5PG
REVIEWS
"Adventures which have a fast
response time, are spectacular in
the amount of detail and number
of locations, and are available to
cassette owners .. Simply
smashing!” - Soft, Sept 83
"Colossal Adventure is included
in Practical Computing s top ten
games choice for 1983: "Poetic
and tough as hell.” -PC, Dec83
To sum up, Adventure Quest is a
wonderful program, fast, exciting
and challenging. If you like
adventures then this one is for
you - NIL UG issue 1.3
“Dungeon Adventure is
recommended. With more than
200 locations, 700 messages and
100 objects it will tease and
delight!”
- Educational Computing, Nov 83
“Snowball As in all Level 9's
adventures, the real pleasure
comes not from scoring points but
in exploring the world in which the
game is set and learning about its
denziens . . this program goes to
prove that the mental pictures
conjured up by a good textual
adventure can be fe . . are vivid
than the graphics available on
home computers.”
- Which Micro?, Feb 84
“Lords of Time. This program
writen by newcomer Sue Gazzard,
joins my favourite series and is an
extremely good addition to Level
9's consistently good catalogue
As we have come to expect from
Level 9, the program is executed
with wonderful style - none of
those boring “You can’t do that"
messages! Highly
recommended” PCW,1stFeb84
y
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PCW187
MASSSTORAGE
If the bubble bursts
Oneexcitmg data storage development has slipped quietly into the UK
with a minimum offuss. ITs taken almost twenty years to get here andcould
signalthebeginningoftheenc[fordiskdrives. Whatisbubblememoryand
howdoes it work? Mike Mephan reveajs a//.
Memory is the name of the game, and
the name of the memory is bubble.
Fujitsu is first into the UK market with a
one megabit magnetic bubble memory
unit marketed by Immediate Business
Systems at £690. Fujitsu also offers,
though not in Europe, similar devices as
alternatives to disk drives on its FM8
and FM16 micros.
In the US, a number of portables with
bubble memory have appeared, such
as the badly-named Portabubble from
Teleram which weighs in at 101b and
has become standard word processor
issue to reporters on the New York
Times.
One of the reasons why magnetic
bubble memory has taken so long to
realise its full potential in the computer
industry is that the technology is not
easily explained in words of one
syllable. The people who have been
involved in its development over the
past 20 years have tended to talk about
bubble memory in terms which are not
easily understood by the average elec¬
tronics technician, and would be com¬
plete gobbledygook to the hobbyist.
Theory of magnetism
It is necessary to understand some of
the theory of magnetism at this point.
The accepted difference between
a ferromagnetic and a non¬
ferromagnetic substance is in their
atomic structures. Unique to the ferro¬
magnetic substance is the fact that at
least one of the electrons of each of its
atoms has a spin about the axis of the
atom which is uncompensated by any
other electron.
Iftwo neighbouring atomsfindthem-
selves with their uncompensated elec¬
trons spinning in parallel, not only do
they maintain that position, but begin a
chain reaction of forcing atoms next to
them to assume the same alignment. In
this way, all the atoms in the substance
have their unbiased electrons spinning
in parallel very quickly and the subst¬
ance is totally self-magnetised to
saturation point.
However, the substance is of a
crystalline nature and each crystal is
divided into magnetic domains. While
each domain is totally saturated mag¬
netically, not all domains lie in the same
magnetic direction.
In fact, nature being as clever as it is,
the effect is of the magnetic forces of
each individual domain of the crystal
combining to give an overall minimum
magnetic force as close to zero force as
possible, so it can be seen that in
ferromagnetic substances these forces
exist as a natural state.
Not all these magnetic substances act
in exactly the same way. Some are
totally random in the way the magnetic
domains lie, some have a directional
preference. In addition, some have
larger domains than others.
The materials used in the manufac¬
ture of bubble memories are iron oxide
compounds described as rare earth
garnets. By combining these materials
in different proportions and by adding
other non-ferromagnetic materials, the
magnetic properties ofthe bubbles can
188 PC W
be altered quite substantially.
The most important factors to be
considered when choosing the right
substance are the stability of the
magnetic bubbles once formed, their
size and the uniaxial magnetic prop¬
erties of the substance.
If the substance is one which prefers
its domainsto lie along a single axis, in
other words north and south but never
eastand west, ithasa uniaxial magnetic
anisotropy (which means it has diite-
rent properties in different directions).
By cutting through that material at right
angles to its axis, you would see each of
the domains in cross section. At that
moment the domains would appear as
long, unformed shapes (Fig 1).
‘Magic’
The magic starts when an external
magnetic field is applied to the overall
cross section. Each domain shrinks in
size, eventually taking on a uniform
shape, and that's a bubble (Fig 2).
If the external magnetic field is
increased the bubble continues to
shrink, eventually collapsing; its
magnetic direction becoming the same
as the domain surrounding it. The
magnetic force needed to form and
maintain the bubble is quite critical.
Now we have two essential com¬
ponents of our bubble memory: the
garnet material containing the magne¬
tic domains; and the external magnetic
forces to maintain the magnetic do¬
mains in their bubble form at all times.
Fig 1 The ferromagnetic garnet is
self-magnetised to saturation
although the magnetic forces are
arranged into domains of opposite
polarity , cancelling any overall
magnetic effect. It will remain like
this until an external magnetic force
is applied.
Fig 2 At a critical point, the external
magnetic force will bring the
shrinking domains to a point where
they become cylindrical in shape;
these are the bubbles.
If the magnetic force applied to the
garnet were increased beyond this
point , the bubbles would reach a
state of collapse and take on the
polarity of the surrounding domain.
Each bubble can be thought of as a
tiny cylindrical bar magnet floating in a
sea of opposing magnetism. While it is
surrounded it can only remain at its
point of creation; but it does want to get
away so it takes only the slightest
change inthedirection ofthesurround-
ing magnetic bias to make the bubble
scurry off in exactly the right direction.
This indicates that a third component
is required to alter the direction of the
magnetic field surrounding the bub¬
bles. The component takes the form of a
pair of field coils enveloping the garnet
integrated circuit and the bias magnet;
the windings of the coils are at right
angles to one another.
Now that we know that bubbles are
highly mobile elements in the structure,
we're a whisker away from understand¬
ing exactly how they're used as a data
storage medium. Three more com¬
ponents are needed to complete our
elementary bubble memory chip: the
first is a means of creating a bubble in
exactly the right position in the garnet;
second is a method of detecting the
presence of a bubble; and third is the
capability of organising the movement
and structuring the organisation of
bubbles which have been generated.
Once you have these components,
it's not difficult to understand that a
bubble can be created to represent a bit
of data and moved down a line of
storage elements until all the elements
have been used up in a typical write
operation, or shifted down the line past
the detector element, vacating storage
elements, in a read operation. Data
consisting of a series of ones and zeros
will be represented by creating a bubble
for a 'one' and not creating a bubble for
a 'zero'.
The storage elements are very simple
iron alloy 'stepping stones' for the
bubbles. The elements are deposited
on the surface of the garnet chip and the
bubbles hop underneath the stepping
stones within the garnet. It's also
importantthat no permanent magnetic
field can remain in the stepping stones,
so they are made from magnetically
'soft' material.
Simplicity
Organising the movement of bubbles is
simplicity itself. By feeding alternating
current through one of the field coils, it
can be seen that an alternating magne¬
tic force will be set up surrounding the
garnet. If a similar current but 90
degrees out of phase with the first is
sent to the second coil, another alter¬
nating magneticforce will surroundthe
chip at right angles to the previous
force. When both are working together,
the result is the setting up of a rotating
magnetic field. As the field rotates, the
magnetic polarity of the specially
shaped stepping stones is altered
sequentially (Figs 3-7).
Unlike poles attract, so the bubble
will move very quickly from its current
position to the element displaying an
opposite polarity to its own. Hopping
Fig 3 Movement of a bubble: the
large arrow indicates the current
direction of the rotating field. Soft
iron elements take on the magnetic
polarity of the rotating magnetic
field , while the bubble within the
garnet acts like a tiny bar magnet
with a constant polarity. The field in
this position attracts the bubble to
the nearest 'south'. T-bar elements
illustrate the principle , but more
efficient elements such as
asymmetric chevrons are more
commonly used in bubble memory
chips.
Fig 4 First change in polarity for the
elements forces the bubble to move
to the centre of the T' element.
Fig 5 Another change and another
hop for the bubble.
Fig 6 End of the first cycle brings it to
the last stop in that element.
Fig 7 First move in the second cycle
takes our first bubble to the second
element and another bubble moves
into the first element position.
PC W189
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MASSSTORAGE
from stepping stone to stepping stone
as the polarity of the elements change,
the bubbles form a continuous stream
of serial data.
If the currentto the coils is stopped, so
too is the movement of the bubbles.
They remain static, safely stored by the
field generated by the bias magnetic
until the rotating field getsthem on the
move once more.
Log jams at the end of the line are
easily avoided by shunting bubbles into
a storage loop, where they happily hop
around in a circle until the music stops
(Fig 8).
In this simplified description we have
a bubble being generated at the begin¬
ning of a line, moved down the linestep
by step and then detected at the line
end. Some storage capability has been
indicated by the loop' structure but, at
present, once the bubble comes to the
end of the line for detection it is
destroyed and lost forever.
In order to ensure that data can be
read more than once, it's necessary to
add yet another component to the
bubble chip — a replicator. Instead of
reading the bubbles which were origi¬
nally stored, replica bubbles are cre¬
ated and a branch made in the line of
stepping stones.
Theoriginal bubbleswill nowhappily
continue their looping forever and a
day, with replicasshooting off downthe
branch to the end of the line for
detection (reading) and ultimate des¬
truction.
A chip constructed in the fashion
described here would be workable but
impractical. Remember that if the de¬
vice is to compete with other mass
storage systems, it must be capable of
holding tens of thousands of bits. If all
these bits are to be read sequentially,
read and write timing will be excessive.
If, for example, the frequency of the
rotating drive field created by the bias
coils is 50KHz, this is the bit shift rate.
Reading the last bit entered into a 64k
chip would occur 1.28 seconds after the
write operation.
Thesolution isto have, instead of one
very long loop, a number of much
shorter loops, each being accessed at
the same time. This is achieved by
having an inputtrackwhich, once full of
bubble data, transfers its data in a
parallel operation into a number of
loops. If the 64k chip is organised as 128
loops of 512 bits, no single bit is,
theoretically, further away from the
detector than 512 bits. Access time in a
read operation is reduced to 10 milli¬
seconds compared with the previous
time of over a second.
All these operations require very
complicated and precise control sig¬
nals, and a whole new family of
bubble memory interface chips have
been developed alongside bubble
memories.
The circuitry needed to drive the
bubble memory is fairly standard in
electronic terms, but there are a few
different processes to be controlled and
synchronised.
The field coils, for example, have to
be driven simultaneously to create a
field rotation frequency of 50KHz with
an error margin of one per cent.
Ensuring that both stop and start
together withoutthetypical problem of
'ringing' is a feat in itself; to synchro¬
nise, read, write, replicate, swap and
destroy signals, all of which have their
own sequence and timing characteris¬
tics, has been a major achievement in
electronic engineering.
Conclusion
Thequestion still remains: have bubble
memories missed the boat or will the
totally solid state home computer be a
reality in the future? My guess is that
flexible magnetic media is already
redundant technology, and that within
a relatively short period of time the cost
of bubble memories will plummet to a
level which will make it comparable
with a good floppy disk unit.
The remaining manufacturers in the
market have already made their com¬
mitment to the technology — millions
have already been spent in getting it
right; bubble memory must be the best
researched and developed technology
of the computer age. The early prob¬
lems have been overcome by applying
belt and braces safeguards to an
unprecedented extent compared with
other memory devices.
Early bubble memory applications
failed because too much was expected
of the technology. Realism has re¬
placed the initial naive optimism which
was the cause of so many burned
fingers. Now there is a product avail¬
able which actually does what the
makers say it does.
Confidence in bubble memories will
rapidly gain momentum over the com¬
ing year or so, and we'll see more
mundane and accessible applications
of the technology than the highly
specialised military and scientific uses
it's currently put to.
However, no matter how many spe¬
cialised applications are found for
bubble memory, there will never be
enough to bring the price of the
technology down to the mass manufac¬
ture prices of floppy disk systems. This
will only be instigated by one of the big
personal computer manufacturers—of
the size of IBM or Apple — deciding to
install bubble memories in their com¬
puters in preference to floppy disk
drives. This will give chip manufactur¬
ers the confidence to bring their prices
down. Once that happens, the down-
wardspricespiral will beginand bubble
memory will finally start to fulfil its
promise.
Thanks to Immediate Business
Systems for permission to reprod uce
bubble memory drawings.
‘Earlybubble memory applications failed because too much
was expected of the technology. Realism has replaced the
initial naive optimism which was the cause of so many burned
fingers. . .Confidence in bubble memorieswill rapidly gain
momentum over the comingyearorso and we ’Usee more
mundane and accessible applications of the technology. ’
PCW191
IF YOU WANT
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Understanding
dBASE II
Alan Simpson £16.50
Learn programming
techniques for mailing
label systems, book¬
keeping, and data
base management, as
well as ways to inter¬
face dBase 11 with other
software systems.
Illustrated in two
colors, this book is
helpful for the
advanced user and
indispensible for the
beginner.
ISBN 0-89588-147-0,
7" x 9", 220 pp.,
illustrated
Practical
WordStar Uses
Julie Anne Area
£ 11.95
Master WordStar!
First get an overview of
what this powerful
program can do for
you, then learn to
streamline all of your
word processing tasks
in a simple step-by-
step manner. This
task-oriented guide
uses realistic
examples to illustrate a
wide range of useful
applications, including
standard paragraphs,
form letters, and out¬
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MailMerge functions
and the basics of CP/M
and PC-DOS are also
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command reference
poster makes this the
most useful and
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ISBN 0-89588-107-1,
7"x 9", 303 pp.,
illustrated
Programming
the Z80
RodnayZaks £13.50
Over 500,000
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Novice and ex¬
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Designed as a
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includes systematic
descriptions of Z80
hardware organiza¬
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Application examples
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you measure your
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ISBN 0-89588-069-5,
6" x 9", 624 pp.,
200 illustrations
The
CP/M Handbook
RodnayZaks £10.95
Over 350,000
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This beginner's guide
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Step-by-step descrip¬
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ISBN: 0-89588-048-2,
6" x 9", 320 pp.,
100 illustrations
Programming
the 6502
RodnayZaks £10.95
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applying simple
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Programming exer¬
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ISBN: 0-89588-135-7,
6" x 9", 408 pp.,
160 illustrations
The IBM PC-DOS
Handbook
Richard Allen King
£12.95
Understand and
enhance the capa¬
bilities of your
IBM PC! This inter¬
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to PC DOS will tell
you where to find and
how to handle the
various parts of DOS,
and how to adapt your
PC to meet specific
application needs.
Appendices include a
complete memory
map, detailed directory
and file formats, and
the differences
between Versions
1.0 and 1.1 of
IBM PC DOS.
ISBN: 0-89588-103-9,
7" x 9”, 296 pp.,
illustrated
The RS-232
Solution
Joe Campbell £11.95
Finally, a book that will
show you how to
correctly interface
your computer to any
RS-232-C peripheral.
This method requires
no expensive tools and
only minimal know¬
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Detailed diagrams,
clear explanations,
and examples using
brand name products
help you get it right
the first time.
ISBN: 0-89588-140-3,
7" x 9", 225 pp.,
illustrated
SYBEX Computer Books are available through most leading bookshops and
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SVBEXCOM PUTE R BOOKS
This month LinnetEvans bids farewell to PCW with herpick^oMhe-bunch
frorn the IBM PC library. From owners'manuals to business software,
sheJeavesnojpageujTturned
IBM PC and XT Owner’s
Manual
Authors: Barbara Lee Chertok, Dov
Rosenfeld & James H Stone
Publisher: Robert J Brady Co (distri¬
buted Prentice-Hall)
Price: £13.45 (paperback)
Over the last year the choice of titles
pitched at certain popular home com¬
puters, the BBC for example, has been
quite staggering. The one thing to be
said here is that a number of field
leaders have emerged and the great
majority of books are home-grown, so
there's something of a running order
and mistakes aren't on the whole too
expensive.
Take the wider and deeper market
around the PC, push up prices to import
level, substitute specialist bookshops
for Smith's and Menzies — that's
roughly how we stand in relation to XT
ecstacy.
It's a measure of the current market,
too, that while the magazines have
been paying good attention to the
lookalikes from Corona, Eagle et al,
these have, as such, gone virtually
unrecorded in the book world.
This last comment is a comment only,
and not a criticism, of the content of the
IBM PC and XT Owner's Manual.
Subtitled 'A practical guide to opera¬
tions', it's even more machine-specific
than its title might suggest. Here, the
three authors start with the premise
thatthe official manuals are a pain in the
butt, so the Owner's Manual is a
shorter, smarter paraphrase of core
information. Again, the target reader is
the new owner who simply wants to get
things done without too many gaffes.
Here, though, the bias is away from
Basic—getting just a token coverage—
and far more into hardware and operat¬
ing software. One big spin-off is the
opportunity to discuss possible con¬
figurations outside of the standard IBM
offerings. While many books of this ilk
confine themselves to PC-DOS, the
Manual shows how to partition a hard
disk for alternate operating systems. (It
doesn't, however, stray beyond a basic
definition of p-System and CP/M-86.)
Discussion of differences between
various releases of the mainline DOS is
also to the fore, which could prove
useful if you're adapting software or
swapping machines. A chapter on
communications and a compact but
friendly glossary provide the tailpieces.
As with all good PC books, the
Owner's Manual is written in a concise
and calm style with a reasonably clear
layout and the indubitable voice of
experience. At the end of the day it's an
eminently likeable book.
The IBM Personal
Computer Handbook
Editor: Dzintar E Dravnieks
Publisher: Prism Press
Price: £11.95 (paperback), £16.95 (hard¬
back)
Very heavily promoted on its launch
earlier this year, The IBM Personal
Computer Handbook sitting on the
shelf looks like War and Peace along¬
side the average paperback. On check¬
ing,! was still quite surprised that it runs
to well over 400 pages, since its
arrangement takes the edge firmly off
any sense of 'weightiness'.
The Handbook is very much what you
care to make of it, although it's clearly
intended by the publishers as a long-
range reference book. The first part
consists of 10 chapters, ranging from a
general introduction to more or less
need-specific chapters on areas like
spreadsheeting, comms and games. In
the best-regulated society there would
194 PCW
perhaps be more common standards
between the chapters and more cross-
referencing, but then again we might
miss out on the traits and whims of
some of the individual writers. For the
major business applications, a bunch of
buzzwords and some ideas on kick-off
questions are normally offered.
The second part is an extremely
thorough dictionary of all manner of
proprietary packages, ranging from
general to trade-specific applications,
from languages to programming utili¬
ties. Shadowing this is a section dealing
with hardware bolt-ons, peripherals,
periodicals, user groups, and so on. In
each case, a brief factual description is
given under the contact name.
Naturally this is all US-biased, and
naturally you're not too chuffed. It does,
however, give what was probably a
wall-to-wall view of the full range of IBM
and indie goodies at the time.
More importantly, the original direc¬
tory is backed by a similar, albeit
smaller, listing of UK supplies. This was
furnished by PC User and, importantly,
contains homegrown products which
aren't in the US listings.
Another particularly relevant feature
— others please note — isthe inclusion
of information on memory, OSand disk
requirements which may, of course,
vary widely. In the case of the operating
system, while PC-DOS is predictably
thefront runner, CP/M-86 and p-System
are also to hand if needed.
The IBM Personal Computer Hand¬
book is a classic of its kind and will be
bought by many libraries and indi¬
viduals for its value as a reference book.
It will also be read (if not bought) as a
ginger-book, a big buzzbox of ideas.
Even if you're torn between the two, at
under £12 it's not that much more
expensive than War and Peace.
IBM Displaywriter
User’s Guide
Author: Judy Crondahl
Publisher: Robert J Brady Co (distri¬
buted Prentice-Hall)
Price: £11.65 (spiralbound paperback)
Despite the officious title, the IBM
Displaywriter User's Guide is no blue-
stamped publication but very much an
independent offering.
The IBM Displaywriter shares certain
superficial characteristics with the PC.
What it overtly doesn't share is the
ready capacity to communicate (with¬
out an overhead of extra cards and disk
drives) with its more popular cousin, or
indeedany otherbitof IBM kit. Instead it
presents a staunchly self-contained
face to the world with its Textpack and
Recordpackfunctions; the latter being a
dedicated word processor's database.
To add insult to injury, at least one UK
company is reported in a recent edition
of PC User magazine as supplying its PC
business applications software reconfi¬
gured for the Displaywriter including
word processing. Big blue'ssmall white
elephant?
Judy Crondahl declines any such
political or philosophical embroiling,
preferring simply to show how the
beast can work. Quite openly, she
doesn't take time explaining 'how word
processors work', or whatever, and it's
probably best to have someone on call
with at least general word processing/
computer knowledge. With this pro¬
viso, the User's Guide makes a respect¬
able self-teaching course for Textpack.
In the earlier chapters, the reader is
taken through the basic typing, format¬
ting and printing functions together
with essential information on function
keys. While the style is compact and
eminently businesslike, it's not without
its lighter moments. The system's
stylised upright diskette unit, for exam¬
ple, is branded as 'the toaster'. A fair
number of likely 'what if...' questions
are picked up and answered squarely
too, cross-referenced to other sections
as necessary.
Central chapters cover the rather
wider territory of housekeeping, sys¬
tem repatching and also the spelling
checker. It might have been helpful to
give more emphasis on the 'why' here,
as well as the 'how', against which
relatively complex and perhaps un¬
familiar operations are clearly and
confidently presented, which is two-
thirds of any battle. As before, screen
menus, prompts and working exam¬
ples are shown.
The Reportpack section makes no
pretence, quite rightly, at being com¬
prehensive. Its nuts-and-bolts agenda
should, however, map out the relevant
avenues for both operator and mana¬
ger, if indeed these are separate people.
Unlike the plethora of PC-based titles,
the IBM Displaywriter User's Guide will
have minimal competition. It's not a
book for the totally unaided novice, but
it certainly defines its aims and fulfils
them very well.
A Guide to the Best
Business Software for
the IBM PC
Author: Richard C Dorf
Publisher: Addison-Wesley
Price: £12.95 (paperback)
When the fuss is over, it's a pure fact
that a PC from IBM has to be the PC for
many. Small businesses and solo oper¬
ators in particular are often attracted
equally by the range of software
available and by the IBM marque.
This is very much the initiative behind
A Guide to the Best Business Software ,
a very professional-looking offering
from a prolific author. And the core of
the book is indeed dedicated to thumb-
nail-plus reviews of proprietary soft¬
ware available for the small blue one.
For better or worse, these are original
scripts and not culled from magazines.
Prior to the grand slam denouement ,
there's a couple of chapters of introduc¬
tion to microcomputers conceptually,
and the PC in particular. Not the usual
breezy tack so often deployed by our
transatlantic cousins, but a leader
clearly custom written for the real new
generation of computer users — the
octogenariansofWyoming. Yes, I know
that charges not merely of ageism but
also of middle-Americanism may now
be levelled against me, but it looks like
the only explanation for Mr Dorf's
groping, almost anachronistic pedan¬
try at this stage.
The central chapters are each de¬
voted to a particular application such as
word processing, or a pair like the odd
bedfellows of mailing lists and time
management. In each case, there's
some kind of generic introduction,
sometimes with a cross-package com¬
parison followed by a brief discussion
of a selection of branded packages
themselves.
Some healthy UK developments are
perforce omitted. While frustrating,
that's less of a fault than the missed
opportunities among the packagesthat
are featured. Score charts are given for
'ease of use', 'documentation', 'reliabil¬
ity' (whatever that may be) and 'cost-
effectiveness' (ditto).
Yet to be really helpful to either
business or individual users, these,
frankly, require more back-up text than
is usually given. The inclusion of the
odd comment on date of first release or
best-seller status for example only
underlines the omission of this data on
other occasions.
One reason for a survey of this kind is
surely the opportunity to separate the
newand heavily-advertised sheepfrom
the older, less advanced but perhaps
sturdier goats.
Best Business Software cannot be
dismissed out of hand, and certainly
provides a more suitable intro than
ploughing through dozens of maga¬
zines. Its more limited coverage and
lack of distractions could equally make
it a betterchoice in some circumstances
than the marathon IBM Personal
Computer Handbook reviewed along¬
side. However, its whole approach
being that much slighter, the ball comes
that much more swiftly back into the
reader's court.
E0
PCW195
Private tiition
Teaching someone toplaychess—unjess yotj have tjie patience of
anangej—is a good way of discovering yourtojerancejevei But
teacftersandfoeg/nnersneedfrefnomore: ffteChess Tutor forfhe
48kSpectnjm maybe tjTeperfectantidote, as TonyHarrington discovered.
It is astounding how slowly the human
mind comes to terms with new con¬
cepts and rules. If yourtemperament is
anything like mine, no matter how
badly you play chess, you'll soon find a
distinct edge in your voice as you point
out for the umpteenth time the dis¬
astrous consequences of a novice's
latest move! There are few things I find
more irritating than seeing a beginner
pick up a white bishop and deposit it on
a black square.
Fortunately, provided the would-be-
chess player has a Spectrum, there is no
reason why any human being should
have to waste valuable hours teaching
another how to play the game. The
Chess Tutor from Braveline (£9.95) will
do it all for you.
Chess Tutor is an excellent program,
well worth its weight in gold to anyone
who wants to learn how to play chess. It
is also, in my opinion, a great improve¬
ment on the self-teach method, where
you sit down with an introductory book,
chessboard and pieces. To start with,
beginners find reading chess moves
almost impossible. They confuse the
addresses of squares and get into
terrible muddles. A phrase like 'Qe3-b6'
looks totally opaque and can kill off
one's interest right at the start.
Chess Tutor cuts out the muddle by
the simple device of displaying ani¬
mated graphics. When ittellsyou about
the rules governing knight moves, for
example, it displays an animated
knight, moving smoothly about the
chessboard.
Aimed at the absolute beginner it
takes nothing for granted. The program
is cassette-based. But this is no dis¬
advantage since all the information you
require is displayed on the screen.
Chess Tutor contains a surprisingly
large amount of material which covers
everything that the out-and-out begin¬
ner needs to know about playing chess
— from how to move the pieces, to
sophisticated tactical concepts like
double checks and skewers.
The use of animated graphics com¬
bined with text is outstanding and
demonstrates just how valuable com¬
puter-assisted learning can be in this
area.
The main menu appears as follows
when the program is loaded:
Introductory Course one:
1) The board, starting play,
pawns and knights
2) Bishops, rooks, queen, king
3) Castling exercises, check,
checkmate and stalemate
4) Stalemate exercises, perpetual
check, capture and pins
5) Forks, double attacks and
skewers.
Select a number. Which part do you
want?
Enter 0 to stop
Chess Tutor is cunningly designed.
The master routines, which handle
things like the movement of sprites, the
graphics display, loading routines and
so on, are held in the 'master program
routines'. Each of the options on the
main menu is a separate set of routines
on the tape and has to be loaded
separately. If you have loaded Option 1
and want to move on to Option 3, the
code for Option 3 would overwrite that
for Option 1. In this way the limits of the
Spectrum's 48k are overcome.
The sub-menu for Option 1 covers six
options: the board, starting play, the
pawn (basic), en passant, promotions,
the knight. The technique for all Chess
Tutor's lessons is the same. A green
and white squared chessboard is dis¬
played in the right-hand half of the
screen, with enough space below it for
five or six lines of text, plus more text in
the left-hand half of the screen. This is
used to display the record of moves,
and for messages requesting user
responses, like 'Press any key to con¬
tinue', or 'Input a move'.
Thefirst lesson starts with a pointthat
beginners generally wouldn't consider.
The chessboard always has to be
positioned with a white square in the
bottom right position. This is the only
way that a board can be set up so that
each player's queen is on the square of
the appropriate colour (that is, white
queen on a white square, black on
black).
When it deals with the rules gov¬
erning pawn movements, the graphics
display is an invaluableteachingaid.To
illustrate the two possible moves a
pawn can make when it starts off, the'd'
pawn slides gracefully from d2 to d3,
then from d2 to d4. The diagonal
capture and the complexities of en
passant pawn takes are all clearly
demonstrated in the same fashion.
If there are definite advantages to a
computerised, screen-based chess
tutor, there is also one, fairly substan¬
tial, disadvantage — at least as far as a
cassette-based program is concerned
Jumping from one section to another is
a good deal more complicated than
flipping over the pages in a book.
Nevertheless, Braveline has done
everything a programmer could do to
make moving between sections a re¬
latively painless operation. Selecting,
say, Option 5 from the main menu,
instead of Option 1 means that the
program takes six minutes to load
instead of two. This is because the
program routines for Option 1 lie
immediately after the master routines
while Option 5 routines are at the end of
the other side of the tape. But that's
what you have to put up with when you
use a sequential storage device.
Once you press '5' to indicate your
selection, full instructions for finding
and loading section five appear on the
screen. Basically this involves no more
196PCW
than rewinding the tape, flipping the
cassette and pressing PLAY on the
recorder; and a message showing you
the section code being received (sec¬
tion three, then section four, finally,
section five) will appear.
Once section five has loaded there is
a 30 second delay while the program
merges with the master routines (this
happens with each move to a new
section) then the display for section five
appears.
Within a sub-menu, all the options on
that menu are accessible instantly
without any further reloading. The
concepts in section 5 are the staple
ingredients of tactical play. As always,
the most basic concepts are explained
first of all. The 'fork' is illustrated by
simple pawn forks, much used in
beginner games, then goes on to more
complex matters, like knight forks.
Narrative instructions and advice are
excellent. For example, Chess Tutor
reminds the beginner that pawn forks
against pieces are always powerful,
even if the pieces are defended, since
the pawn's value is less than that of the
pieces. It may not be the sort of stuff to
keep seasoned chess players awake,
but it isabsolutelyvitalforthe beginner.
One of the best things about the
program is that many subtle little points
emerge almost as by-products of the
main point being demonstrated. The
illustrative position for knight forks, for
example, shows a black knight on c6,
attacked by a white queen on e6, with a
white rook on b3. Chess Tutor points
out that 'The black knight is under
attack, but it is black to move . . The
graphics display then shows the knight
sliding to d4 and forking the rook and
queen.
This provides a vivid example not just
of the fork, but of the cut-and-thrust that
makes chess so rewarding. Defence
has turned into attack in a single move.
This is the sort of 'intuitive' lesson that
beginners will find themselves picking
up almost without realising while they
work their way through the program.
Atthe end of every lesson a summary
screen appears which restates the main
points of the lesson. It is amazing how
much text the program manages to
accommodate. The summary for'forks'
alone contains eight separate points.
If beginners had memories like com¬
puters, and could apply their know¬
ledge, a few hours spent alone with
Chess Tutor would suffice to turn them
into very good club players. Since they
don't have, t| won't. But they will learn
how to play chess.
Beginners using Chess Tutor in con¬
junction with one of the handful of good
chess programs for the Spectrum
should find it an excellent way of
getting into the game.
Games section
White: Cray Blitz. Black: David Levy.
Notes by Dr John Nunn.
This month's game is another from the
match between David Levy and Cray
Blitz. Last month I described how David
beat the computer world champion 4-0
in convincing style, so let's go straight
into the chess.
1
e2-e4
a7-a6
2
d2-d4
g7-96
3
Ng1-f3
Bf8-g7
4
Nb1-c3
b7-b5
5
Bf1-d3
Bc8-b7
6
0-0
d7-d6
7
Bc1-f4
e7-e6
(Black has adopted an
unusual plan
of development to take the computer
out of its opening book, butthismoveis
taking the unconventional approach a
bit too far. 7... Nb8-d7 was much safer.)
8 e4-e5
(White sees the chance to gain some
space, but this sort of central thrust
needs good piece support and is only
effective after all the forces have been
brought into play. 8 Rf 1 -el or 8 Qd1-d2
would have been better.)
8 ... d6-d5?
(I'm sure David wouldn't have played
this move against a human opponent!
His aim isto keep the position as closed
as possible to reduce the tactical
possibilities, which are the machine's
main strength. Objectively the move is
bad because it blocks in the bishop at b7
behind a wall of pawns.)
9 b2-b4!
(If played by a human, thiscould only
have been produced by a beginner or a
grandmaster! Basically Black has the
initiative on the queenside and White
has the upper hand on the kingside. All
the books tell you not to touch your
pawns on the side where your oppo¬
nent is attacking, but this position is a
rare exception. Black's only counter¬
play will come from... Nb8-d7 followed
by ... c7-c5, and White, unhindered by
the books, logically prevents... c7-c5.)
9 ... Nb8-d7
10
Qd1-d2
Ng8-e7
11
a2-a4
c7-c6
12
a4xb5
(Undoing some of the benefits of the
ninth move. 12 a4-a5 was the logical
culmination of White's plan, complete¬
ly blocking the queenside. Action could
then only take place on the kingside,
where circumstances greatly favour
White.)
12 c6xb5
13 Bf4-h6 0-0
14 Bh6-g5?
(A completely pointless waste of-
time. White's last move quite correctly
aimed to exchange Black's important
defensive bishop, but at the last mo¬
ment White pulls back. 14 Bh6xg7
Kg8xg7 15 Nc3-e2 Nd7-b6 16 h2-h4
Nb6-c417 Qd2-f4 would still have given
White a dangerous attack.)
14 ... Rf8-e8
15 Ra1-a3?
(This is awful. Black's knight at d7 is
heading to c4 and when it arrives White
shouldn't exchange it because a recap¬
ture by the pawn at d5 will turn the
somnolent bishop at b7 into a power¬
house of activity along the long diagon¬
al. The position of the rook at a3 sets up
a self-fork when the knight arrives,
forcing White to make the unpalatable
exchange.)
15
... Nd7-b6
16
Nc3-d1
Nb6-c4
17
Bd3xc4
d5xc4
18
Nd1-b2
Qd8-c7
19
Rfl-al
Re8-c8
(Threatening to win a piece by... c4-c3.
White prevents this, but in doing so cuts
the line of guard from a3 to f3, allowing
Blackto shatter White's king defences.)
20
c2-c3
Bb7xf3
21
g2xf3
Ne7-f5!
22
Ra3xa6
Ra8xa6
23
Ra1xa6
Qc7-b7
24
Ra6-a5
Qb7xf3
25
Ra5xb5
h7-h6
(Finally, David Levy has allowed some
complications to start, but only when
the outcome of the game has already
been decided. White's defenceless king
is far more important than his extra
pawn.)
26 Bg5-f4 Qf3-h3
(26 . . . Nf5-h4 was tempting, but
White's king could then flee the
threatened mate by 27 Kgl-fl. Now,
however, White's escape route is cut
and ... Nf5-h4 is a deadly threat.)
27
Bf4-g3
h6-h5
28
Rb5-c5
Rc8-a8
29
Qd2-c1?
(29 Rc5-a5 would have been a more
resilient defence.)
29
... h5-h4
30
Bg3-f4
Qh3-f3
31
h2-h3
(Desperation, but there was no de¬
fence in any case. After 31 Rc5-a5, for
example, Black could have won with
the beautiful combination 31.. .Ra8xa5
32 b4xa5 h4-h3 33 Kgl-fl Bg7-h6! 34
Bf4xh6 Nf5-g3+! 35 h2xg3 h3-h2 fol¬
lowed by promotion and mate.)
31 ... Qf3xh3
32 Rc5xc4 Qh3-f3
(Black returns, with all the original
threats and more besides.)
33 Bf4-h2 h4-h3
34 Qcl-fl Ra8-a1
(Deflecting the queen away from the
defence of g2 and forcing mate.)
35 Nb2-d1 Ralxdl
36 Resigns
EH
PCW197
3^ Ourmonthly pot-pourri of hardware and
software tips forthe popular micros. If you have
a favourite tip to pass on, send it to TJ's
Workshop, PCW, 62 Oxford Street, London Wl.
Please keep your contributions concise. We will pay £5-£30 for any tips we publish. PCW can
accept no responsibility for damage caused by using these tips, and readers should be
advised that any hardware modifications may render the maker's guarantee invalid.
SPECTRUM
SCREENS
Here are two short machine
code routines which will
instantly storeand recall a
screen picture.They runona
48kSpectrum.
10clear51680 : for n = 51681
to 51704: read A: poke n, A:
nextn
20 Datal,0,27,17,255,201,
33,0,64,237,176,201,1,0,
27,17,0,64,33,255,201,237,
176,201
30clear51656 :forn = 51657
to 51680: read A: pokeN,A:
nextN
40 Data 1,0,27,17,255,228,
33,0,64,237,176,201,1,0,
27,17,0,64,33,255,228,237,
176,201
Thefirst one (lines 10-20)
stores a screen at location
51711 and is operated by:
STORE: Randomise USR
51681
BBC SELF¬
LEARNING DATA
ENTRY
The routine providesa
methodof in puttingdata
with a minimum of typing by
recognising words as the
characters are typed. The rest
oftheword isthendisplayed
on the input line and a gentle
beep signals this. RETURN
willcausethefunctionto
answerwiththewordonthe
data entry line. If the word is
notthe one required then the
DELETE key can be used as
normal.
The routine is most useful
when the number of entered
options is limited. It has been
successfully used to input
school subject names; for
examples Physics and
Maths. The maximum
RECALL: RandomiseUSR
51693
The second one (lines 30-
40) stores a screen at location
58623, and is operated by:
STORE: RandomiseUSR
51657
RECALL: RandomiseUSR
51669
Once stored a picture may
be recalled as many times as
you like.Thetwo routines,
plus the code for the screen
pictures, use up all memory
locations from 51656
upwards.
To save the machine code
forthe routines, simply type:
SAVE "RECALLER" CODE
51656,50
The stored codefor picture
oneissaved by:
SAVE "PIC 1" CODE 51711,
6912
Thesecond issaved by:
SAVE "PIC 2" CODE 58623,
6912
A Normington-Smith
number that can be used is
only limited bythe
degradation in response
time. I havetestedtheroutine
with 100 known wordsand
theresponsetimeis
completely satisfactory. If
many more words were
needed then some simple
tuning,forexample,
shortening all the variable
names in the function, would
speed up the responsetime.
Theself-learning aspect of
the routine isthatany
unrecognised words can be
added to the list of known
words simply by answering
yesto a question. Thus no
setting upormaintenance
routines for known words are
needed.
The routine works by
storing known wordsina
matrixasshowninFig I.As
characters are typed the
value of line% and col%are
updated to showthe current
position in the matrix.
Forexample:
Input line% col%
B 2 1
I 2 2
0 2 3
L 3 4
Aftereach character has
been typed a check is made to
see if the characters upto
col%online%+1 arethe
sameasthoseon line%. If
they are, then the word is not
yetclear. Assoonas
they are notthe same, the
rest oftheword isprinted.ln
the example above BIOLOGY
wouldappear.
DELETE is handled by
keeping track of the previous
value of line%intrace%(..)
andsteppingbackto
previouslineswhen
necessary. Again inthe
example iftheY,G,0 and L
were deleted then line% and
col%wouldendupas2and3
respectively, so if 'C' were
pressedthen
BIOCHEMISTRY would
appear.
Known words are stored
on a file which needs to be
read in and written outeach
time a program using the
routineisrun.The
procedures here do this.
Two majorerrors which
canoccurwhen usingthe
routine in a program have
beencateredfor: filling up
the known words array; and
notbeing abletoextendthe
fileondisk.
Although this routine was
written on and for a disk
system,cassette userscan
still use it by incorporating
the known words in data
statements instead of afile.
Fig2doesjustthis.
Note
(1 (Padding out of the known
words with dots must be left
in for the routine tofunction
correctly.
(2) The routine at present
only accepts alphabetic
charactersandspaces;all
lowercase lettersare
converted to upper case. This
could easily be altered to
match the implementation of
theroutine.
10 subjectmax%=50
20 DIM trace%( 16),subject$(50)
30 FOR 1%=1 TO
subjectmax%:subject$(1%)=STRINGS! 15,""): NEXT
40 READsubjects%
50 FOR 1%=1 TOsubjects%
60 READAS
70 IFLENA$<15THEN
subject$(1%)=A$+STRING$(15-LENA$,".")
ELSEsubject$(1%)=A$
80 NEXT
90 DATA8, "ALGEBRA","BIOCHEMISTRY",
"BIOLOGY","BOTANY","CHEMISTRY",
line% 1
2
3
4
5
6
col%
7 8
9
10
11
12
13
14 15
1
A
R
T
n
n
n
n n
9 9
n
9 9
"
9 9
99 99
2
B
1
O
C
H
E
M 1
s
T
R
Y
99
9 9 9 9
3
B
1
O
L
O
G
Y "
"
9 9
9 9
9 9
99
9 9 9 9
4
B
O
T
A
N
Y
9 9 9 9
"
9 9
"
9 9
9 9
9 9 9 9
5
P
H
Y
S
1
C
S "
9 9
9 9
9 9
9 9
9 9
9 9 99
Fig 1
198 PCW
"ECONOMICS","PHILOSOPHY",
Fig 2 "PHYSICS"
Paul Nix
10 REM** Self learnin* input routine.
20 REM** Author: Paul Nix
30 REM** Date: 16.6.84
40
50 REM
■ Demonetration Program
60 M0DE7
70 PROCreadmubJects
80 0NERR0RGQT0120
90 REPEAT:A**FN*et»ubject(0. 10)
100 PR1NTTAB(0.20)A*
110 UNTILFALSE
120 IFERR-17 THENPROCwr i tesubjects: END
130 REPORT:PRINT" at line “:ERL
140 END
150 REM -
irde to enture no duplication.
160
170
180 DEP FNsetsub ject (screencolumnX, ecreenl me'/.)
190 LOCAL C7.» IX, C»,A», B*, start'/., OSBYTE
200 0SBYTE=&FFF4
210 F’RINTTAB (ecreencol umnX, screen 1 i neX) SSTRING*<15, '*. ” ) 5
220 PRINTTAB (screencol umnV.. ecreenl ine'/.) 5
230 FOR 154*1 TO 15: trace'/. (154) =0: NEXT
240 1 ine7.= l: col 54=1: char 54*0
250 newwor d 7.-0: CC*= " "
260 REPEAT
270 C'/.-GET
280 IF C54= 127 THEN PROCdel ete: GOTO 480
290 IF C"/.= 13 THEN PRINT: GOTO 480
300 IF char54=15 THEN 480
310 IF C7.=32 THEN 340
320 IF C54<65 OR C'/.<97 AND CX>90 OR C7.>122 THEN 480
330 C5i=C54 AND &DF
340 char54=char54+l
350 trace'/. (char5C)=l ine’/.
360 C*=CHR*C7.:PRINTC*S
370 CC*=CC*+C*
380 neMMord54=l
390 line'/.=l ine'/.-l
400 REM Check ,CC*--a-sainst list of subjects
410 REPEAT
420 1 ine'/.=l i ne'/.+ l
430 UNTIL LEFT* (subject* (1 ineXV, col54) >=CC*
440 REM Check if a match Mas found
450 IF LEFT* (subject* (1 ine*/.) , col XX >CC* THEN col X-col'/.+ l: GOTO 480
460 REM Check if match is unique and Print the subject if it is.
470 IF LEFT* (subject* (1 i neX) . colXX >LEFT* (subject* <1 i ne'/.+ l) > col*/.) THEN FROCp
rintword ELSE col 54=col 54+1
480 UNTIL C54=13 : REM only exit when RETURN is Pressed
490 A*=”": A54=135 : REM read input from screen usins OSBYTE
500 FOR I'/.=screencolumn7. TO screencolumnX+14
510 VDU31,154, scree'nlinsX: A*=A*+CHR* ( <USR (OSBYTE) AND &FFFF) DIV&100)
520 NEXT
530 REM store input up to first dot.
540 B*=LEFT*(A*.INSTR(A*+1)
550 IF newword'/.=0 THEN-B*
560 154=0 : REM check asainst list of i
570 REPEAT
580 154= 17.+1
590 UNTIL A*<=subject*(IX)
600 IF A*=subject*(154) THEN-B* : REM already in th# list
610 VDU28.0.24.39.22 '■ REM window for messages
620 CLS
630 IF sub j ec t s'/. < sub ject max 7.-1 THEN 660
640 PROCnosp1it("No sore subjects can be added at present. Please exit the Pro
sram and restart. Press SPACE to continue.")
650 REPEAT UNTIL GET-32:CLS* VDU26:=B*
660 PROCnospl it ("Do you wish to add ,( +B*+" to the list of subjects (Y/Nk?*?
670 I54=GET: PRINTCHR*I54
680 IF CHR*(154 AND &DF)<>“Y” THEN CLS:VDU26:GOTO 210 : REM ask for input asain
690 PRINT’SPC10;"Please wait-
700 sub ject* (sub jects‘/.+2) =A*
710 subjects7.=subjectsX+1
720 PROCsort (subjects'/.)
730 CLS>VDU26
740 =B*
750
760
770
780 DEF PROCnrintword
790 LOCAL 17.
800 I54=INSTR (sub ject* (1 ineX)+" . M . " . M ) -1
810 PRINTMID*(subject*(1ineX)»colX+1.IX—colX):
820 colX-IX+1
830 SOUND 1,-12,20,2
840 newword'/.=0
850 ENDPROC
860
870
880
890 DEF PROCdelete
900 newword'/.-l
910 IF charX=0 THEN ENDPROC
920 VDU^46,B : REM cur^c^ left, dot, cursor left
930 IF colX>charX+l THEN colX-colX-1:ENDPROC
940 REM step back to Previous position
950 CC*=LEFT*(CC*,LENCC*—1)
960 1 ineX-traceX (char*/.)
970 ch*rX=charX-l: col'/.-char'/.+ l
980 ENDPROC
990
1000
1010
1020 DEF PROCsort (end'/.)
1030 LOCAL IX,JX,T*
1040 FOR I'/.-1 TO end'/.
1050 IF subject* (I'/.+ l) >sub Ject* (IX) THEN 1110
J'/.=IX+1
REPEAT
T*=sub Ject*( JX): subject* (JX) -sub ject*( J'/.-l) : subject* (JX-1) =T*
1060
1070
1080
1090
1100
1110
J'/.=J'/.-l
UNTIL JX—1 OR subject*(JX-1)<subject*(JX)
NEXT
1120 ENDPROC
1130
1140
1150
1160 DEF PROCnosplit(A*)
1170 LOCAL LX
1180 LX-LEN(A*>
1190 IF LX+C0UNT<40:PRINTA*;:ENDPROC
3200 REPEAT
1210 REPEAT
1220 REPEAT
1230 LX-LX-l
1240 UNTIL LX<1 OR MID*(A*,LX,1)=
1250 UNTIL L7.+C0UNT< =40
1260 PRINTLEFT*(A*,LX-1)
1270 A*-RIGHT*(A*,LEN(A*)-LX)
1280 LX-LEN(A*)
1290 UNTIL L*/.<40
1300 PRINTRIGHT*(A*,LX)I
1310 ENDPROC
1320
1330
1340
1350
1360
1370
1380
1390
1400
1410
1420
1430
1440
1450
1460
1470
1480
1490
1500
1510
1520
1530
1540
1550
1560
1570
1580
1590
1600
1610
1620
1630
1640
1650
1660
1670
1680
1690
1700
1710
DEF F’ROCreadsubjects
LOCAL chan
DIM trace'/. (16)
chan=OPENIN("D.SUBJECT")
IF chanOO THEN 1430
sub jectsX=0« sub ject max 7.-50
DIM subject*(50)
GOTO 1470
INPUT#chan, subjects'/,
sub ject max'/.=sub Ject sX+20
DIM subject*(subjectsX+20)
FOR I7.-1 TO subjects'/.: INPUT#chan,
FOR IX*subjectsX+l TO subjectmaxX
CLOSEMchan
ENDPROC
DEF F'ROCwritesub Jects
LOCAL chan
ON ERROR GOTO 1670
chan-OPENOUT("D.SUBJECT")
PRINTDchan, subjects'/.
FOR I7.-1 TO subjects'/.:PRINT#chan,
CLOSE#chan
IF ERR-191 THEN END : REM File ha
ON ERROR OFF
ENDPROC
IF ERR0191 THEN REPORT: PRINT" at
PROCnosplit("FILE BEING EXTENDED-
CLOSE#©
-DELETE D.SUBJECT
GOTO 1550
TORCHLIGHT ON
PERFECTWRITER
If you have invested inthe
BBC/Torch ZDP/Perfect
Software package and have
had difficulty in sorting out
thediscrepancies between
PerfectWriter
documentation and
performance, here issome
helpful information.
DeleteCommands:
Contary to the PerfectWriter
manual, the 'Delete' key (or
CTRL-D) erases only the
currentcharacter,andESC-D
erases only forwards to the
end of the current word (the
nextword ifthecursorisata
space). To getthe much more
useful backwards-deleteyou
mustuseCTRL-H(forthe
previous character) and
ESC-H (forthe previous
word).
Additional Commands:
Hidden away in Appendix C
of the manual you will find
someotheruseful
commands not mentioned
elsewhere. Butbewareof
those which claim to return
'Unknown command 7 : some
ofthem haveunpleasant
side-effects.
Function Keys: Fig 1 offers
afile,BEGIN.SUB,called
from key f9 (set by Torch to
return'BEGIN 7 ). This will set
upthe BBC'sfunction keys
forthe mostuseful
commands. ItusestheBBC's
cursor-control keysforlarger
movementsthroughthe
text; but if you setthese
rememberto resetthem with
subject*(IX):NEXT
subject*(IX)-STRING*(15,"!"):NEXT
subJect*(IX):NEXT
s been saved but cannot continue
Extend". —
ay not on other DFS —
line “5 ERL:END
PROGRAM WILL THEN TERMINATE"):PRINT
*FX4,0 if you return to Basic
before switching off. Using
S HI FT with keys f 0-f9 wi 11, i n
addition, give you the
commands listed byTorch in
its own installation
documentation (seethe
right-hand column in Fig 1).
There are two further
annoying discrepancies
whichyou will needtoknow
about. When naming a filefor
formatting you must pro vide
thefull file name complete
with extension (not
optionally, as claimed inthe
manual on pages70&77).
Anglicised spellings inthe
manual must be ignored as
theprogramonly
understands American
English (so you'll have to use
CENTER,notCENTRE);and
that goes for Pefect Speller as
well.
Printer Configuration: If
you do not haveoneof
PerfectWriter's
recommended printers,this
can be a nightmare unless
you follow the configuration
prog ram's advice to start
from its'Vanilla'definition
and change one item at a
time, printing out a testfile
after each change in orderto
see what its effect has been.
Fig 2 lists a set of valuesthat
will workforthe Epson FX-80
in normal,eliteand
proportionalformats. Ifyou
need to alter any of the values
(for instance, to allowfor a
different paper size) change
one at a time, and see what
happens.
If anyone has managed to
persuadethe FX-80to
PCW199
producea multi-national
charactersetfrom a Perfect
Writerfile, using French and
German accents in a normal
SPECTRUM
UPPERSCREEN
INPUT
Thismachinecode
subroutine has been devised
to allow input in the upper
part of the screen. The
machinecode isentered into
RAM, saved to tape and
activated by running the
Basicprogram in listing 1
(48kmachine)orlisting2(16k
machine). Once the machine
code has been POKEd into
RAM (lines 10-80)and
activated, by modifying two
of the system variables (lines
lOOand 110), input can be
taken from the upper part of
thescreenbyusingthedata
stream 2.
Forexample: INPUT
#2;AT5,5; "ENTER A WORD
print mode, I should be very
gladtohearaboutit!
Daniel Leech-Wilkinson
";A$
Input may be carried out in
exactlythesamewayin
the lower part of the screen.
While entering a line, errors
and omissions may be
corrected using the delete
horizontal cursor keys.
Whenprogrammingfor
input in the upper part of the
screen a numberof points
require consideration:
a) Whentheinputis
completedtheprint
position movestothe
position immediately
afterthe input.
b) When using "AT" the
parameters relatetothe
upper part of the screen.
c) Printitemsandinputare
not cleared fromthe
screen.
d) Duringinputthelower
partofthescreen is
cleared continuously.
e) Shouldtheinputextend
intothe lower part of the
screen the display does
notscrollandthe
program terminates with
an "OUT OF SCREEN"
errormessage.
f) Wheneverthe machine
code is entered or loaded
into RAM, the subroutine
requiresactivating before
input can be carried out.
The program works by
substituting a call to a
machine code subroutine
intothe input stream of
channel 2 in place of the call
to an error routine. This input
stream does not require
opening because it is one of
thestreamsthatare
permanentlyopen.
To explain in detail how the
programworksitis
necessary to examine how
input is carried out in the
lower part of the screen. The
input command uses the
EDITOR routine in the ROM
to build up the input line in an
input buffer. Each time the
EDITOR requires a character
itcallstheKEYINPUT routine
(at 10A8) indirectly, through
thesystem variables. If a
character is available, the
KEYINPUT routineprintsout
the input line including the
new character inserting the
cursor in the correct position
andthenreturnsthe
charactertothe EDITOR
routine. Printingtheinput
line is carried out in the lower
partofthescreen which
clears each time a key is
pressed. This is why the
addition of characters to an
in put line gets slower as the
lineisentered.
The subroutine has been
inserted as an interface
betweentheEDITOR routine
andthe KEYINPUT routine
utilising the indirect call. It
routesall printingtothe
upper part of the screen,
keepsthe printing tidy and,
where necessary, updates
the system variables.
Each time the EDITOR
requires a character it calls
the subroutine. The first part
of the subroutine stores
away the current upper
screen print position and
then,ifacharacteris
expected,callsthe KEY
INPUT routinealternatively.
If an attribute control code is
expected it callsthe KEY
NEXT routine (at 110D). Once
theKEYINPUTroutine has
been executed, the second
part of the subroutine is
entered.Theprintposition is
restored and a check is made
to see if a key has been
pressed. If it has not, the
system variables are
modified to ensure that the
cursorcontinuestoshowon
the screen. The subroutine
then prints outthe buffer,
substitutesaspaceforthe
cursor and checks to see
whetherthescreenisfull.lf it
is, an error message is
generated. The character
returned by the KEY INPUT
routine is then examined to
seeif itisan'enter',a 'delete'
oranattributecontrol
character,for example,
FLASH,INK. Ifitisan 'enter'
character,the print position
is moved to just afterthe
input and a return is made to
theEDITOR. If itisa 'delete'
character, a check is made to
ensurethataCHR$(6)
separated from a deleted
colour control character has
not occurred, thenthe buffer
is printed out with an
additional space to cover up
any remaining characters.
Attribute control characters
setaflagto warn the
subroutine to expect an
attribute code nexttime the
subroutine is called. A return
isthen made to the EDITOR.
This subroutine adds a
useful extension to the
Spectrum input command
which only requires 200
bytes of machine code. This
facility would have required
far less space had it been
programmed intothe ROM
anditissurprisingthatitwas
notincluded.
Richard Parrot
10
CLEAR 65176
11
DATA 245,229,
42
12
DATA 132, 92,
34,
&!«
255
13
DATA 42,136,
92,
34 j,
14
DATA 255,225,
58,
72 j,
,255
15
DATA 254, 1,
40,
241
‘BEGIN.SUB'
Action
With SHIFT
♦Key 0 !H
Delete previous character
Return to eenu
♦Key 1 iCB
Backward word
HELP eenu
♦Key 2 !B
Backward character
Previous screen
♦Key 3 IF
Forward character
Next screen
♦Key 4 !CF
Forward word
Refresh screen
♦Key S «I<
Open italics
Save file
♦Key 6 §B(
Open boldface
Read file
♦Key 7 IP
Previous line
Write file
♦Key B IN
Next line
List buffers
♦Key 9 nenu !M
Calls PW from CP/M
Switch buffers
♦ fx 5,1
♦ fx 4,2
♦Key 11 !tIN
Continue saving
♦Key 12 1CA
Beginning of sentence
♦Key 13 ICE
End of sentence
♦Key 14 !CN
End of paragraph
♦Key 15 !CP
Beginning of paragraph
Fig 1 Torch filetosetfunction keys,COPYandcursorkeys
for Perfect Writer commands
1. 20955 (8.3 ins.)
2. 304B0 (12 ins.)
3. 254 (10-pitch)
212 (12-pitch)
235 (proportional)
4. 423 (6 per in.)
5. 254
212
21
6. 423
53
7. N
Y
8. (omitted)
OCsee ♦ below]
9. N
10. 0
11. 1
12. Y
13. Y
14. N
15. 1
16. N
17. (omitted)
18.
ESC M
ESC p CTRL-A
19.
ESC P
ESC p
20. CTRL-M CTRL-J
21. ESC G
22. ESC H
23. ESC 4
24. ^SC 5
*Width Table 0 has to be resetto the values given in the
FX-80 manual, pp. 3-105—3-106, taking 1/2 dot as 21.17
micas. Forexample, SPACE=254,! = 106, "=169, etc.
Note: CTRLcodes haveto be preceded by CTRL-Q.
Fig 2 Perfect Writer FX-80 configuration values
200 PC W
DATA
205,168,
16, 24, 12
25
DATA
9, 58,137, 92,254
DATA
241,205,
13, 17,245
26
DATA
3, 32, 2,207, 4
DATA
62, 0,
50, 72,255
27
DATA
241,245,254, 13, 40
DATA
241,201,
229,213,197
28
DATA
20,205, 74,127,^54
DATA
245,205,
74,255, 56
29
DATA
12, 40, 41,254, 16
DATA
2, 40,
62, 62, 1
30
DATA
56, 9,254, 22, 48
DATA
50, 73,
255,205, 51
31
DATA
5, 62, 1, 50, 72
DATA
255,205,
68,255, 58
32
DATA
127,241,193,209,225
DATA
136, 92,
254, 1, 32
. j.
DATA
201, 0, 0, 0, 0
DATA
9, 58,
137, 92,254
3.4
DATA
58, 73,127,254, 0
DATA
3, 32,
2,207, 4
35
DATA
40,240, 33, 60, 92
DATA
241,245,
254, 13, 40
36
DATA
203,222, 62, 0, 50
DATA
20,205,
74,255,254
37
DATA
73,127, 24,228, 42
DATA
12, 40,
41,254, 16
38
DATA
91, 92, 43,126,254
DATA
56, 9,
254, 22, 48
39
DATA
6, 32, 2, 54, 0
DATA
5, 62,
1, 50, 72
40
DATA
205, 51,127,205, 68
DATA
255,241,
193,209,225
41
DATA
127,205, 74,127, 24
DATA
201, 0,
0, 0, 0
42
DATA
206,237, 91, 97, 92
DATA
58, 73,
255,254, 0
43
DATA
42, 99, 92,167,237
DATA
40,240,
33,.60, 92
44
DATA
82, 43, 68, 77,205
DATA
203,222,
62, 0, 50
45
DATA
60, 32,201, 62, 32
DATA
73,255,
24,228, 42
46
DATA
215,201, 0, 1, 42
DATA
91, 92,
43,126,254
47
DATA
6,12.7, 34,132, 92
DATA
6, 32,
2, 54, 0
48
DATA
42, 8,127, 34,136
DATA
205, 51,
255,205, .68
49
DATA
92,201
DATA
255,205,
74,255, 24
50
FOR ;
1=32409 TO 32598
DATA
206,237,
91, 97, 92
60
READ
J
DATA
42, 99,
92,167,237
70
POKE-
I, J
DATA
82, 43,
68, 7 / , ■^'•Owj
80
NEXT
I
DATA
60, 32,
201, 62, 32
90
SAVE
"input"CODE 32409,190
DATA
215,201,
O, l, 4x
100
POKE
23741,153
DATA
6,255,
34,132, 92
110
POKE
23742,126
DATA
42, 8,
255, 34,136
Listing2 16k input
50 FOR 1=65177
60 READ J
70 POKE I,J
80 NEXT I
90 SAVE "input"
100 POKE 23741,1
110 POKE 23742,2
Listing 1 48k input —
TO 65366
CODE 65177,190
53
54
10
CLEAR
: 32408
11
DATA
245,229,
42
12
DATA
132, 92,
34,
6,
127
13
DATA
42,136,
92,
•- 4 !*
8
14
DATA
127,225,
58,
72,
127
15
DATA
254, 1>
40,
6,
241
16
DATA
205,168,
16,
24,
12
1 7
DATA
241,205,
13,
17,
245
IS
DATA
62, O f
50,
72,
127
19
DATA
241,201,
229,
213,
197
20
DATA
245,205,
74,
127,
156
21
DATA
2, 40,
62,
62,
1
22
DATA
50, 73,
127,
205,
51
23
DATA
127,205,
68,
127,
58
24
DATA
136, 92,
254,
1,
32
MACHINE CODE
MUSIC
Since no mention is made in
the Oric manual of howto
accessthe sound chip, I have
worked out howto get into
theEPROM routineswhich
carryouttheBasicsound
commands, thus enabling
soundsto be producedfrom
within the machinecode
programs.
SHOOT,ZAPand
EXPLODEcanbeproduced
with a JSR to &F415,&F41 B
and &F418 respectively, and
a PING may be produced
with LDA&07 and JSR
&F57B(equivalentto PRINT
CHR£(7)).
SOUND, MUSICand PLAY
takeargumentsand,
therefore, need slightly more
code. Arguments are stored
as ordinary two-byte
integersin locations&2E1 to
&2E8.&2E1/2 should contain
thetonechannel(s) selected
for each command, &2E3/4
should contain the period for
the SOUND command, the
octave for MUSIC orthe
noise channel(s) selected for
PLAY, location &2E5/6
contains the volumefor
SOUND,thenotefor MUSIC
ortheenvelopeforPLAYand
&2E7/8 is the volume for
MUSIC orthe envelope
period for PLAY. After setting
upthe arguments, making
surethatthehi-bytes are zero
where necessary, the
commands may be carried
out with a JSR to &F41 E,
&F424or&f421 forSOUND,
MUSICor PLAYrespectively.
(Readers who are unsure
about using this in machine
codestraightaway may like
to experimentwith DOKEs
and a CALL before
incorporating it into a
machine code prog ram.)
AJEdgington
PCW201
COMPUTER ANSWERS
Sendyourqueriesto TonyHetherington, PCW, 620xfordStreet,London W1.
Notethcrt Tonycannolanw an mdjvidua[basis, so please
dotYtsendanSAE_ with yourquery
Lookingfora
cure
The Welsh Drug Information
Centre hasthefollowing
computer equipment:
—North Star Horizon, quad
density
—20Mbyte hard disks
—ADM36VDU—Lear
Sieglerlnc
—Qume Sprint printer
In early 1983, we purchased
dBasellfrom Benchmark
Computer Systems Ltd,
Street, Somerset (which also
supplied the hardware).
Although both thecompany
and ourselves havetriedto
installdBasell ontothemicro,
we have been relatively
unsuccessfulandareonlyable
to make limited use of the
software. I would be grateful,
therefore, if you could help.
The major problem appears
to be the install procedure:
'Enter commandsthat will
clearthe screen and place
cursor in upper left corner.'
According to instructions in
ourVDU manual, ther eare
commandsforhomecursor
and eraseto end of screen. The
problem is that if we havethe
'home cursor'commandfirst,
followed by the'erase
command', the screen clears;
but when recordsare
displayed, somefields are
missing from a record, even
though data has been entered
in.lfthecommandsare
reversed then the records are
displayed, but the screen does
not clear.
In orderfor us to get any sort
of proper record display, the
VDU has to be in VT52 mode,
where there does not seem to
bean escapesequencefor
'clear screen' ratherthan
'erasefrom cursor position'. In
theANSImodethereisa'clear
screen'command, but any
attemptto run dBasell inthis
mode results in a jumbled up
screen which isunusable.
At present, the only way we
can use the system is by
manually clearing thescreen
using several carriage returns
before wetry to appenddata
oredit records. If wedo not,the
records are laid on topof
whatever is already on the
screen.
As you will appreciate, thisis
a real waste of time and
inhibits usfrom using what
would be really useful
software in our line of work.
I hope you will be ableto
offer some guidance.
Mike Spencer, principal
pharmacist, WDIC
Installing systems for different
terminals is always a tricky
problem—even moresowhen
trying to solve the problem
from a distance.
It looks as if you were on the
righttrackwhen you entered
'homecursor'followed by
'erase';thiswouldhavetaken
the cursor to the top left ofthe
screen and then erased the
whole screen. The problem is
that it looks liketheerase
command leftthecursoratthe
bottom ofthescreen, which
would be the cause of your
partial display problems.
The best we can suggest is
that you try'home cursor'
followed by'erase'followed by
another'home cursor'. This
should makesurethatthe
cursorendsupbackatthetop
left ofthe screen aftertheerase
operation.
Your dealer should be ableto
cope with problems I ike this. If
you are unhappy with your
dealer,AshtonTateiskeento
hearfromyou,sowhynotdrop
thecompanyaline.
In search of
high-quality print
I have had a Commodore 64for
nearly six months and would
liketo expand my system to
includea printer. Theproblem
is that I have seen some ofthe
Commodore printers, butthey
don't seem to meet my needs.
Myquestion is: arethereany
other printers availableforthe
64, or am I restricted to
Commodore's own breed?
Susan Lloyd, London N4
TheAlphacom81 printer
reviewed on page 144isone
alternativetoconsider. Itcosts
about£150andisa
high-speed, 80-column
thermal printer. Itmay,
however, be unsuitablefor
your needs as its printquality
tendsto be poor.
The answer is probably to
invest in a Centronics interface
which will allowyou to use any
number of printers: for
example, the popular Epson
range.
The interface may costyou
anything upto£45froma
starting price ofabout£25.The
reasonforthepricedifference
is the medium on which the
printer driver program is
supplied (this is a machine
codeprogram which ensures
that what you wantto print
appearsasyou would likeiton
the paper). The cheaper
interfaces invariably have a
tape-based program, which
would be incredibly slowto
load in every time you wanted
to use your printer. Slightly
faster is a disk-based program,
butbyfarthemostpractical—
and most expensive—arethe
ROM-based programsthatare
integrated intotheinterface
itself.
Incidentally,you should be
prepared to pay between
£300-400for your printer.
No time for
leisure
I have a Sharp MZ-80Kand
used ittosolvetheJunePCW
Leisure Lines problem. Using
the program listed below, I had
thecomputerexamineevery
integer between 100000 and
999999 to see if the product of
thefirsthalfofthenumberand
thesecond half allsquared
equalled the original number.
In orderto reassure myself
that the computer was indeed
performing,! had itprinting
theoriginal number, the
squared product and the error
between the two numbers
wheneverthe error was less
than 50.
An interesting result
followed: even though the
error should have been an
integer, it was not calculated
as suchforthe majority of
occasions. Thefirst 14
'answers' are also listed in Fig
1. Can anybody explain why I
gotthe results I did?
AJFIewitt , Bushey Heath,
Herts
Program
10 FOR X= 100000 TO 999999
20 W$ = STR$ (X)
30D$ = RIGHT$(W$,3)
40 E$ = LEFT$ (W$,3)
50D = VAL (D$)
60E = VAL (E$)
70IFABS(X—((D+E)'2)<50
THEN PRINTX,(D+Er2,
ABS(X-((D+Er2))
80IFX<>((D+Er2)THEN 100
90PRINT"ONE ANSWER IS",X
100NEXTX
Yourproblem istypicalof
many which plague
programmers, and whose
solution issoobviousthatit's
difficulttosee. I painfully
checked the logic, and found
it correct exceptthat you
have used the ABSfunction
insteadofINT.
The ABSfunction ismerely
used to strip numbers of their
minus signs: for example,
ABS(-2.143)returnsthe
number2.143.Thefunction
you should have used is I NT,
which returnstheinteger
part of a number. I NT(2.143)
would return theanswer2.
Help!—sharp
answer needed
After several frustrating hours
trying to load a newly received
Basicode-2 translation
program into my Sharp
MZ-80A, I am left with three
alternatives:
(1) Keepthetapeasa
Christmas presentfor
someone I don't like.
(2) Eat it.
(3) Write a begging letterfor
help.
Having decided against
option (2), and as option (1) is
still a long way off, I settledfor
thefinal choice, which, I
108221
108241
19.999939
110222
110224
1.9999695
112223
112225
1.9998474
114224
114244
20.000214
123228
123201
26.999878
133232
133225
7.0007935
148237
148225
11.99939
155239
155236
3.0004883
159240
159201
39.000366
163241
163216
25.00061
167242
167281
38.999451
172243
172225
18.000916
177244
177241
3.000061
189246
189225
21
etc
etc
etc
Fig 1 Answers (see 'No time for leisure')
202 PCW
hasten to add, immediately
left me blissfully confident
that salvation isathand.
Withoutfurther ado I
present my problem.
I LOAD Basic5510 inthe
normal way, and then attempt
to LOAD Basicode-2. After a
few seconds of tape loading, I
get a screen message'Found
BASC2-551OA' immediately
followed by error message 18
(writing statement issued to
the Basiccontrol area).
The only way I can progress
from this position is, after
LOADing Sharp Basic,to
switch to MONitorandthen
LOAD the Basicode-2.1 now
getalongertapeload,ending
with a return to the screen of
thestandardSharpmessage
that Basic is loaded, except
that now only 30,456 bytes are
available (so a little lessthan
2k has been consumed by
Basicodefrom the 32,492
bytes normally indicated).
However, transferring the
tapeto my hi-fi indicatesthat
not all thecode has been read,
onlyabouthalf.
Entering LIST has no effect,
butentering LOAD/2 displays
eachlineoftheBasicode
subroutine section, lines
10-1000, one at a time until the
"Ready' message appears. The
Basicodesubroutinesmay
nowbe LISTedinthenormal
way.
However, Basicode
programs will not LOAD, and if
IreturntoMONitorandenter
the cold start address J1200,1
am returned to my30,456
bytes and cannot erase the
partial Basicode program
which nowseemsto have
overwritten the Sharp Basic.
Needlessto say, NEW will not
erase the Basicode either. The
only option isto switch off and
startagain.
Broadcasting Support
Services cannot offer advice
on this matter, although it is
exchanging the tape for me.
Neither can the Sharp User
Grouplbelongto.
I am keen to get Basicode
runningonmyMZ-80Aaslfeel
that the concept behind it isa
stepforward for home
computing.
While I appreciate thatto
maximiseonanycomputer's
facilities programs implies
that programs must be written
intheBasicofthetarget
machine, to haveavailablea
common languagemustbea
greatadvantage.
Trevor REscott, Mill Hill,
London NW7
Aswith many questionsofthis
type, you're so close tofinding
thefull answer but just lackthat
final piece of information. To
run Basicode on the MZ-80A,
allyou havetodois:
1 Load intheBasic.
2TypeMON (cr)toenterthe
monitor.
3Load in Basicode-2.
4Typing LOAD/B loads
Basicode into user memory
(LOAD/2 loadsonlythe
Basicode subroutines).
Youshould havenofurther
troublefrom hereon.
This information was kindly
supplied by FrankButterfield,
who also provided the
following details which allows
the MZ-700to also use
Basicode.
At the moment, Basicode is
not available for the Sharp
MZ-700. Usingthefollowing
Basicprogram, it's possible to
use MZ-80A Basic SA-55 lOand
Basicode BASC-5510A on the
Sharp MZ-700.
First load Sharp SA55W
Basic, then return to ROM
monitor by typing MON (CR).
Nowload Basicode
BASC2-55WA.
When Basicode has loaded
and the computerhas returned
to Basic, enter and run the
following program:
WFORK= 1T015
20 READ A,B
30 POKE A, B
40 NEXT
50 END
W0 DATA20804,36,20813,36,
21044,159,21066,
5,21276,159
110 DATA21389,97,21391,97,
21406,90,21438,43,
21454,25
120 DATA21472,45,21485,45,
21498,45,21511,37,
21735,62
If you wish to save the altered
Basicode program, return to
ROM monitor and enter:
S505C5850505C (CR)
Filename BASIC 2-MZ-700 (CR)
European
features
I am using an Epson QX-10 asa
word processor (with Perfect
Writer) for a research project
which involves the useof
several European languages.
One of the attractions of the
QX-IOisthatithastheability
to function in eight keyboards
(including Danish).
However, neither by
switching the pins insidethe
printer nor by programming
thecomputertouseanother
keyboard am I able to achieve
theflexibilitylrequiretomake
proper use of thisfacility.
I find itimpossibletoviewon
the screen or print outtext
containing vocabulary from
several languages. It's as if
manufacturers never
considered thatthis might be
desirableor necessary. For
academicworkinthe
humanities it is essential (for
example,for listing
documents in different
languagesorfor
bibliographies), and general
writersalsoneedtoinclude
foreign placenamesand
proper names, and anglicised
foreign words. On my screen,
and perhaps in PCW, it is
impossiblefora HerrMullerto
meet a Mile Helene in La
Coruna, let alone feast on pate
and crepes washed down with
Lowenbrau.
It seemsto me,asa
newcomerto the world of
microcomputers, that if
manufacturers wish to exploit
thefull potential of software
forwriters, they should make
moreeffortto understand and
establish the latter's
requirements.
I do not know whether to be
disappointed or relieved that
after all thistechnological
breakthrough, I still haveto
use my trusty black biro todo
the work that thecomputer
cannotdo!
Dr Janet Hartley, School of
Sla vonic and East European
Studies, University of London
Perhaps we can throw a little
light on your problems. You
don't mention which printer
you're using, so we'll crossour
fingers and hope it's an Epson
(MX, RX, FX, or even LQ-1500).
The QX-10 can only be
configured for one language at
a time using the CONFIG
program; however, Appendix
Ki n i n the Operations Manual
showsthe keyboard layoutfor
all the character sets.Thus,
providing a change of
international character set in
theform of a printercontrol
code is possible within Perfect
Writer. The appropriate key for
the required language can be
pressed on the keyboard, and
the character seen on the
screen will betheonewiththe
sameASCIIcontrolcodefor
the language selected under
CONFIG. After all, it'sthefinal
printeroutputwhich really
mattersand notwhatis
produced on the screen.
Nowto Perfect Writer. On
pages 303-338 of the manual
are instructionsfor installing
this program for your printer.
There is an option forthe
Epson, but this will only
produce the codes for an
MX-80F/TType 1. Youcanalso
configure it for any other
printer by answering a set of
questions. Page318shows
howthis program can setup
Perfect Writerforan MX-80F/T
Type 3, which has a number of
additional features such as bit
image and italics mode.
TheEpson international
characterset printercontrol
codeisESCR.ESCR + n =
CHR$(27);CHR$(82);CHR$(n),
sincetheASCIIcodeforESCis
27andforR is82.
The letter'n'can take values
0-7,which representtheUS,
France, Germany, England,
Denmark, Sweden, Italy and
Spain respectively.These
codes are all available on the
MXprinters.
Likemany word processors
(including WordStar), the
installation program for Pefect
Writer allows features such as
bold, underlining, superscript
andsubscripttobesetupfora
particular printer. Perfect
Writer and WordStar do not
allow special code sequences
to be inserted in the program,
so enabling the full featuresof
our printers to be utilised,
unlessthecommand iswell
hidden inthe PerfectWriter
Manual (2nd Edition 1983) or
theprogram hasbeen
upgraded.
It isforthis reason that Epson
recommends Peachtext (and
indeed bundle it with the
QX-10). Usingthe'out'
command of Peachtext, any
control sequence can be sent
to employ any feature ofthe
printer.
We sympathise with your
problem. Itisextremely
difficultforafirst-timebuyerto
knowthefeatures required
from a word processor/printer
combination without carrying
outagreatdealofresearch
beforehand. Butifabuyer
writesdown a specification
andadealersellshim
software, the customer is
entitled to his money back ifthe
software and the system does
not meetthe purpose.
The above information was
kindly supplied by Esther
Bayer at Epson who's asked us
to point outthat both she and
John Franklin are always
availableon TechnicalSupport
to answer customers'
technicalqueries. Theaddress
to write to is DorlandHouse,
388High Rd, Wembley,
Middlesex.
Secrets ofthe
Genie
Please could you provide a list
ofthe locations wherethe
Basic command words are
stored in the memory ofthe
Geniel computer, andthe
registers which are involved in
these operations.
Frank Percival, Godaiming,
Surrey
AccordingtoRonald Degg,one
of our Genie I experts, you are
heading intodeepwaterwhere
a guide would be useful.
Hesuggeststhatyou lookin
your local Tandy shop for a
TRS80 Level llassembly
language book, which will help
you as you delve into the 12kof
memory where these
commandsarestored. fm
PCW 203
SUBSET
Da vid Barro wjprasents more documented machine code
rojJtmesandjJsefuUn^mationforthe^ssembjy^
programmer l^youjiaye^goodj^utine, ammproyement
orconversion ofone already printed, orjusta helpful
programming hint, then send it in and share it with other
programmer s. Subroutmesforanyofthepopujar
processors andcomputersare welcome butplease indijde
full documentation. Allpublishedcode willbepaidfqn
Sendyourcontributions to SubSet, PCW, 62 Oxford Street,
London W1A2HG.
SUB SET SYSTEM
From this month Sub Set is
broadening its scope to
include routines written to
interact with specific
computer systems. And
there's documentation to
prove it.
Also from this month, Sub
Set will be given occasional
extra space for passing on all
that information you have
painstakingly discovered
about your computer— how,
and where Basic stores its
variables, howto get intothe
system routines, which areas
of memory are safest for
assembling your code, and so
on.
For the first of these system
pages Sverrir Karlsson of
Kopavgi, Iceland, shows how
to make BBC assembler
programs easier to read.
NEW
DOCUMENTATION
The time-honoured Sub Set
Datasheets have a new look
to them. This isto highlight
the system implementation.
The description now has four
main parts.
(a) A general definition which
should help in converting the
routine for use on other
systems or in other machine
codes.
(b) Details of the system for
which the routine is written.
(c) The actual operation
details of the routine, specific
to the way it is written.
(d) Classification to show
those situations in which the
routine can (marked with '*')
and cannot (marked with '-')
be safely used. Class 1
routines are entirely safe.
The Time critical' section
was so rarely used that it has
been dropped. That, and any
other special considerations,
can be included in 'Job'.
'Errors' is a new section to
point out any problems you
might have in using the
routine — what could happen
if you don't validate input
before calling it, and so on.
'RAM use' is for any
workspace or storage other
than on stack. The 6502 page
zero pseudo-registers MO to
MF can be included here
instead of in 'Reg use'.
'Discreet' routines don't
change any variable except to
pass useful information from
the routine. 'Robust' routines
don't crash or produce
unflagged erroneous results
on invalid input, being
interrupted, or whatever.
COLOURS OF
THE SPECTRUM
The displayed characters and
graphics on the screen of the
ZX Spectrum are more
complex than those of the
TRS-80. Every pixel is either
'paper' (background) or 'ink'
(foreground). Each character
position is a matrix of 8 x 8
dots whose ink and paper
colours are controlled by a
byte in an 'attribute file'. The
dot pattern displayed or the
colours used can each be
separately changed.
INKPAP, written by BJ
Lowry o ? Hornchurch,
changes the displayed
colours on the full screen. It
also sets the system variable
which controls the colours of
any further printing. The
actual pattern of dots is not
disturbed.
DATASHEET
: = INKPAP Global Ink and Paper change.
s JOB
To change
the foreground and background
colours
of all current screen locations and the
system
s
attribute
variable.
:ACT I ON
Calculate
attribute values from input values.
For each byte in attribute filet
C store
new attribute ].
Store new
attribute to system variable.
: CPU
Z80.
(HARDWARE
Written for ZX-Spectrum.
:SOFTWARE
Local subroutine usei
(
CALC - Combine colour codes in one byte.
i
CHANGE - Store new value to attribute file.
:INPUT
E * Ink code (0 - 7). D * Paper code (0
- 7).
jOUTPUT
E = paper
and ink colour attributes. D >
• 0.
s
All bytes
in attribute file and attribute
s
variable contain new attributes.
iERRORS
Input E (ink) > 7 will affect paper colours
.
:REG USE
DE
:STACK
USE
10
* RAM USE
None.
:LENGTH
51
(CYCLES
Not given.
:CLASS
2
-discreet
*interruptable apromable
■ -*»-
-reentrant -relocatable -robust
:
ATTRP
EQU
23693
{Permanent colour system variable.
ATTRF
EQU
22528
{Start of attribute file.
ATTRE
EQU
5BH
{Hi-byte of attribute file +
1.
I
INKPAP
PUSH
AF
:Save flags
F5
PUSH
BC
{and registers
C5
PUSH
HL
(used in INKPAP.
E5
CALL
CALC
tGet new attribute byte.
CD
lo hi
CALL
CHANGE
(Change all attribute file.
CD
lo hi
LD
A,E
(Also store new attribute
7B
LD
(ATTRP),A
(in system variable for
32
8D 5C
POP
HL
(permanency. Restore
El
POP
BC
(registars
Cl
POP
AF
(and flags.
FI
RET
(Return to calling program.
C9
{...Subroutine to combine paper and ink attr. in one byte.
CALC
LD
A, 0
(Clear new attribute in A.
3E
00
LD
BC ,0
(Clear counter.
01
00 00
LOOP
INC
C
(Increment counter.
OC
ADD
A,D
:Get paper colour in bits
02
PUSH
AF
(3, 4 i 5 of A by adding
F5
LD
A,C
(eight times into A.
79
CP
8
(Test if 8 additions done,
FE
08
JR
NZ,N0T0UT
(continuing if not,
20
06
POP
AF
(else get paper back and
FI
ADD
A, E
(add in ink to bits 0, 1
83
LD
E,A
(and 2. Store in E and
5F
LD
D,0
(dear D.
16
00
RET
(Return to INKPAP.
C9
NOTOUT
POP
AF
(Recover partial attribute
FI
JR
LOOP
sand loop until complete.
18
EF
i
{...Subroutine to store attr. in ail attribute file.
CHANGE
LD
HL, ATTRF-
1 (Index attribute file.
21
FF 57
CL00P
INC
HL
(Point to next byte.
23
LD
A, H
(Test if point gone past
7C
CP
ATTRE
(last attribute byte and
FE
5B
RET
Z
(return to INKPAP if so,
C8
LD
A i E
seise get attribute
7B
204 PCW
LD
(HL) ,A
:into file byte and
77
JR
CL00P
srepeat until all changed.
18 F7
INVERTING PIXEL
GRAPHICS
The TRS-80 and Video Genie
use a graphics system based
on a sequence of 64
characters. These can be used
to display any combination of
pixels in a 3 x 2 matrix in
each character position. Text
and graphics can be mixed.
SGREVfrom Tom Ithell of
Alveley in Shropshire will go
through screen RAM and
invert each pixel, leaving the
text unaltered. The only ASCII
character it does affect is 20H
which is inverted to a fully lit
graphics character. SGREV
should be easily converted for
use on any computer with a
similar, binary sequence,
pixel graphics set.
DATASHEET
•ZX33B3SaaS3S*BB3BB8BBBBSSSSS38S3BSSSSSSSSS38SS3BZ3SS=3ZB3ZZ
:* SGREV Screen Graphics Reversal.
(383888888X833SS3SBS3SZ3S3SS333a=3ZE3C=BEC3=3Z=3BSX3S3S3SE33
iJOB To reverse (invert) monochrome graphics pixels
i displayed on screen,
s ACTION For each character in screen memory:
> [ Convert text spaces to graphics spaces.
: IF not graphics char THEN skip
i ELSE char * lastchar - (char - firstchar) ]
: CPU
Z80
:HARDWARE
Written Tor TRS-80 models I/111 or Video Genie.
:SOFTWARE
None.
:INPUT
None.
I OUTPUT
None.
I ERRORS
Re-reversal of completed part if re-entered.
:
Text spaces irreversibly changed to graphics.
tREG USE
None.
:STACK USE
8
IRAN USE
None.
:LENGTH
44
iCYCLES
Not given.
:CLASS 2
♦discreet
♦interruptable tpromable
j ♦♦♦-*-
-reentrant
♦relocatable -robust
i
SPACE EQU
32
.•ASCII space.
PIXLIT EQU
96
:Graphics space minus text space.
PI XL 1 EQU
128
•Lowest graphics code (graphic space).
PIXL64 EQU
191
•Highest graphics code (inv.
space).
PIXL63 EQU
192
•Graphics ♦ 1.
SCREEN EQU
1024
sNo. of screen bytes.
VIDEO EQU
15360
iVideo RAH start address.
SGREV PUSH
AF
iSave flags
F5
PUSH
BC
land registers
C5
PUSH
DE
tused in
D5
PUSH
HL
iSGREV.
E5
LD
BC,SCREEN
:Get screen byte count
01 00 04
LD
HL,VIDEO
land start address.
21 00 3C
AGAIN LD
A,(HL)
iGet next byte and
7E
CP
SPACE
itest for ASCII space, skip
FE 20
JR
NZ,GRAF IX
ito graphics test if not,
20 02
ADD
A,PIXLIT
telse make it graphics space.
C6 60
0RAFIX CP
PIXL1
ilf byte < first graphics
FE 80
JR
C,NEXT
ithen no reversal.
38 0C
CP
PIXL65
ilf byte > last graphics
FE CO
JR
NC,NEXT
ithen no reversal.
30 08
LD
E,PI XL 1
iGet char position in
IE 80
SUB
E
{graphics set,
93
LD
E, A
i (char - firstchar) in E.
5F
LD
A,PIXL64
{Reverse position,
3E BF
SUB
E
ilastchar - position in A
93
LD
(HL) ,A
ithen back to screen RAH.
77
NEXT INC
HL
iIndex next screen byte.
23
DEC
BC
iRepeat for
0B
LD
A, B
tall bytes
78
OR
C
i i n
Bl
JR
NZ,AGAIN
iscreen RAH.
20 E3
POP
HL
iRestore
El
POP
DE
iregisters
D1
POP
BC
i and
Cl
POP
AF
iflags.
FI
RET
{Return to calling program.
C9
LEGIBLE
LISTINGS
BBC Basic is a very powerful
tool and the more so since
6502 assembly language
programs and subroutines
can be embedded in the Basic
program. Variables assigned
in the Basic can be used in the
assembler and, as in Basic,
the assembler supports
multi-statement lines.
The only problem with this
wealth of facilities is that of
readability. The Beeb doesn't
go in for normal assembler
formatting.
Ratherthan helpyoufind
yourwaythrough a routine,
commentstendtoobscureas
in Listing 1 of LSTFMT,apatch
bySverrirKarlssonfortheBBC
print routine WRCH.LSTFMT
formats progress to normal
assemblerfields.Listing2is
the result of LSTFMT actingon
itself.
Type the program in as it
appearsinListing I.Runitand
thentype in LIST01 —the
list option to print a space
after each line number.
Before LISTing press function
key 1 to format, function key 0
to list normally in List Option
1 or the BREAK key (*KEY 10)
to list without spaces (Option
0 ).
The string in *KEY1 loads
the address of LSTFMT into
the OSWRCH vector. *KEY0
replaces the OSWRCH
address. *FX 6,10 stops LF
(line feed) being sent to the
printer since most printers do
this automatically on carriage
return.
Several words of warning:
Sverrir has found out that the
locations &D00 and &D01 are
set to &FF on machine reset,
hence the origin at &D02. If
you have a DFS disk system
you will have to assemble
LSTFMT higher in memory
since LOMEN is moved up
from &E00 to &1900. Finally,
don't try to edit your
programs in the formatted
mode — LSTFMT is strictly a
one way process.
DATASHEET
10REM % "LSTFMT" - FORMATTED ASSEMBLER LISTING
20#FX 6,10
30*KEY 10 IN OLDIM
40*KEYO"?S.20E-&A4s ?8c20F = 8cE01 M H
50*KEYl"?lc20E»*02i?l(20F»&OD: ! «c70=0 I M M
60REM * VECTOR PRINT ROUTINE WRCH
70QSWRCH"?l<20E + ?fc20F*256
B0REM % SYSTEM READ OF CURSOR POSITION
900SBYTE“liFFF4:csrpo»*6B6
100REM - SET UP PAGE ZERO USE
llOaimfl-1.701 cmtf 1-1.71 1 lblfl-67211 itf 1 -t(73i tabst-<c74i teapA-S.7S
120REM " NAME FORMATTING CHARACTERS
130a smi n = 1.58: asmout-1.5D: col on *1(3 A: quotes-622: carret-fcOD: lnfeed*i0A
140space»S.20:l abel -1.2E: commnt-l<5C
150REM * FIELD TAB SETTINGS
160col tab*4:1 bl tab-6: mnmtab»14: cmntab*28: Ini dth-59
170F0R 1-0 TO 2 STEP 2
180PX-1.D02
190C0PT I
200STA tempA \Save value in zero page
210 PHPjTXAiPHAjTYAsPHA \Save registers and
220LDX tempA \get input value in X for tests.
230TXA:SEC:SBC fcarret:BNE qtest \Test for line end.
240STA cmtfl:STA lblfl:STA litfl \Clear comment, label k literal flags.
250BEQ bexit \Hop to exit.
260.qtest CPX #quotes:BNE lftest \Test for literal start/end.
270LDA litfl:E0R «1:STA litfl \Toggle literal flag on/off.
280DEX:BNE width \Hop to line-end test.
290.lftest LDA litfl:BNE width \No formatting if flag on.
300CPX tcoloniBNE asstst West statement as new line.
310STA cmtfliSTA lblfl \Clear flags
320JSR lfeed \Go to new line.
330LDY #coltab:JSR tabout Wab to colon position.
340TXA:JSR OSWRCH \Print colon,
330LDA tspaceiSTA tempA:BNE exit \then a space on exit.
360.asstst CPX *asmin:BNE asetst West for assembler start.
370INC asmfl:BNE width \Flag on and go to line-end test.
380.asetst CPX #aimout:BNE aftst West for assembler end.
390DEC asmfliBEQ width \Flag off and go to line-end test.
400.aftst LDA asmfl:BEQ width \BASIC if flag off - no format.
410LDA cmtfl:BNE width Wnside a comment - carry on.
420CPX IcommntiBNE lbftst West for comment start.
430INC cmtflsLDA ttcmntab:JSR pos \Comment flag on and test print position.
440BCC exitiBEQ exitiTAYsJSR tabout Wab to comment field if needed.
450.bexit BEQ exit \Also "stepping stone to exit'.
460.lbftst LDA lblfl:BEQ lbtest West if inside a label.
470CPX IspacesBNE exit \Print if not end of label,
480DEC lblfl:BEQ exit \else flag off and print space.
490.lbtest CPX IIabel:BNE lintst West for label start.
500INC lblfl:BNE exit \Flag on and exit to print
510.lintst CPX Ispace:BEQ exit \Print space on exit.
520CPX 4tc30:BCC mnmtst:CPX #&3A:BCC exit \Digits ok - probably line number.
530.mnmtst LDA #mnmtab:JSR pos:BCC exitiBEQ exit \Exit if in mnemonic,
540TAY:JSR taboutsBEQ exit \else tab to mnemonic field.
550.width LDA !lwidth:JSR pos:BCS exit \0kay if not at line-end
560JSR lfeed \else next line and
570LDA cmtfliBEQ lblpos \skip if not in a comment
580LDY #cmntab:JSR tabout \else tab up to comment position and
590LDA #commnt:JSR OSWRCH:INY:BNE exit \write new comment symbol.
600.lblpos LDY llbltab:JSR tabout \Else tab to label field.
610.exit PLA:TAY:PLA:TAX:PLP \Restore registers and
620LDA tempA:JMP OSWRCH \exit through character print routine.
630.tabout LDA ttspace:JSR OSWRCH:DEY:BNE tabout:RTS
640.lfeed LDA IcarretsJSR OSWRCH \Using 0SNEWL would send CHR* 13 and 10
Listing 1
PC w 205
SUBSET
650LDA #1nfeed:JSR OSWRCH Uhrouqh LSTFMT and overwrite
660RTS \the character stored in tempA.
670.pos PHAiLDA #csrpos:JSR OSBYTE \Read text cursor position.
680STX tabstsLDX tempAiPLA \store it and recover registers
690SEC:SBC tabstiRTS \get position difference and return.
700]
710NEXT
DATASHEET
10 REM * "LSTFMT" - FORMATTED ASSEMBLER LISTING
20 *FX 6,10
30 *KEY 10 IN OLDiM
40 *KEY0"?lt20E*&A4j?fc20F*&E0!M"
50 *KEY 1 "?8»20E =s &02s ?8t20F = 8c0Ds !*70 = 0iM"
60 REM * VECTOR PRINT ROUTINE WRCH
70 0SWRCH*?&20E+?fc20F*256
80 REM * SYSTEM READ OF CURSOR POSITION
90 0SBYTE=&FFF4
: c9rpos a 8t86
100 REM v SET UP PAGE ZERO USE
110 asmf 1 »8c70
i cmtfl-8c71
: 1 bl f 1 -Sc72
: 1 i tf 1 * & 7 3
j tabst»it74
i tempA»8c75
120 REM % NAME FORMATTING CHARACTERS
130 asmin*8<58
: asmout B 8(5D
j colon*S<3A
s quotes«8(22
: carret = 8cOD
: lnfeed®8cOA
140 space«8(20
: label = 8<2E
j commnt*8(5C
150 REM v FIELD TAB SETTINGS
160 coltab«4
: lbltab-6
{ mnmtab*14
i cmntab=28
i lwidth-59
170 FOR I«0 TO 2 STEP 2
180 P'/.*8eD02
190 C
OPT
I
200
STA
tempA
\Save value in zero page
210
PHP
:
TXA
i
PHA
:
TYA
:
PHA
\Save registers and
220
LDX
tempA
\get input value in X for tests.
230
TXA
:
SEC
:
SBC
#carret
:
BNE
qtest
\Test for line end.
240
STA
cmtf 1
•
STA
lblfl
:
STA
1 i t f 1
\Clear comment, label St literal
\f1ags.
250
BEQ
bex i t
\Hop to exit.
260 .qtest
CPX
tquotes
:
BNE
If test
\Test for literal start/end.
270
LDA
litf 1
:
EOR
#1
!
STA
litf 1
\Toggle literal flag on/off.
280
DEX
t
BNE
width
\Hop to line-end test.
290 .1f test
LDA
litf 1
:
BNE
width
\No formatting if flag on.
300
CPX
#colon
j
BNE
asstst
NTest statement as new line.
310
STA
cmtf 1
s
STA
lblfl
\Clear flags
320
JSR
1 feed
\Go to new line.
330
LDY
#coltab
:
JSR
tabout
\Tab to colon position.
340
TXA
l
JSR
OSWRCH
\Print colon,
350
LDA
tspace
:
STA
tempA
:
BNE
exit
\then a space on exit.
360 .asstst
CPX
#asmin
s
BNE
asetst
\Test for assembler start.
370
INC
asmf 1
i
BNE
wi dth
\Flag on and go to line-end test
\.
380 .asetst
CPX
iasmout
:
BNE
aftst
\Test for assembler end.
390
DEC
asmf 1
i
BEQ
width
\Flag off and go to line-end tes
\t.
400 .aftst
LDA
asmf 1
s
BEQ
wi dth
\BASIC if flag off'- no format.
410
LDA
cmtf 1
3
BNE
width
\Inside a comment - carry on.
420
CPX
#commnt
s
BNE
lbftst
NTest for comment start.
430
INC
cmtf 1
t
LDA
Vcmntab
3
JSR
pos
NComment flag on and test print
Nposition.
440
BCC
exit
3
BEQ
exit
3
TAY
3
JSR
tabout
NTab to comment field if needed.
\
450 .bexit
BEQ
exit
\
NAlso "stepping stone to 'exit'.
\
460 .lbftst
LDA
lblfl
3
BEQ
1btest
NTest if inside a label.
470
CPX
#space
5
BNE
ex i t
NPrint if not end of label,
480
DEC
lblfl
3
BEQ
exit
Nelse flag off and print space.
490 .1btest
CPX
#1abel
3
BNE
lintst
NTest for label start.
500
INC
lblfl
3
BNE
exit
NFlag on and exit to print
510 .lintst
CPX
#space
3
BEQ
ex i t
NPrint space on exit.
520
CPX
#8(30
3
BCC
mnmtst
I
CPX
#8c3A
3
BCC
exit
NDigits ok - probably line numbe
Nr.
530 .mnmtst
LDA
#mnmtab
3
JSR
pos
3
BCC
exit
3
BEQ
ex i t
NExit if in mnemonic,
540
TAY
3
JSR
tabout
3
BEQ
exit
Nelse tab to mnemonic field.
550 .width
LDA
#1width
3
JSR
pos
3
BCS
exit
NOkay if not at line-end
560
JSR
lfeed
Nelse next line and
570
LDA
cmtf 1
3
BEQ
lblpos
Nskip if not in a comment
580
LDY
tcmntab
1
JSR
tabout
Nelse tab up to comment position
N and
590
LDA
#commnt
3
JSR
OSWRCH
3
INY
3
BNE
exit
Nwrite new comment symbol.
600 .lblpos
LDY
#1b1 tab
3
JSR
tabout
NElse tab to label field.
610 .exit
PLA
3
TAY
3
PLA
3
TAX
:
PLP
NRestore registers and
620
LDA
tempA
3
JMP
OSWRCH
Nexit through character print ro
Nutine.
630 .tabout
LDA
•space
3
JSR
OSWRCH
3
DEY
3
BNE
tabout
3
RTS
640 .lfeed
LDA
#carret
3
JSR
OSWRCH
NUsing OSNEWL would send CHR* 13
N and 10
650
LDA
#1nfeed
3
JSR
OSWRCH
Nthrough LSTFMT and overwrite
660
RTS
Nthe character stored in tempA.
670 .pos
PHA
3
LDA
#csrpos
3
JSR
OSBYTE
NRead text cursor position.
680
STX
tabst
3
LDX
tempA
3
PLA
Nstore it and recover registers
690
SEC
3
SBC
tabst
3
RTS
Nget position difference and ret
Nurn.
700 ]
710 NEXT
Listing 2
206 PC W
A FRESH APPROACH TO THE PC
MBS Microtex Limited Raychem House Tangier Lane
High Street Eton Windsor Berks SL4 6BD
Telephone: Windsor (07535) 68171 Telex: 848945
74
I you ’re hesitating about buying an IBM PC. Perhaps what you really want is
IBM compatibility, but with the power and style that just hasn’t been available
to date.
Well, now you can have the very latest technology and one of the most
beautifully engineered products on the market, MAD-1.
MAD-1 is a joy to use because of its thoughtful, ergonomic design. And it is
lightning fast because it utilises the latest 8018616-bit processor. Literally,
MAD-1 is the BMW of microcomputers.
IBM compatibility means you can take practically any IBM PC program we
know of and run it without modification. That gives you a choice of hundreds of
the world's finest and latest software.
MAD-1 is backed by MBS Microtex, one of Britain’s largest computer
distributors. So you can rely on the best there is for service and support.
Telephone (07535) 68171 for details.
EXCLUSIVE UK MAD-1 DISTRIBUTOR
| t’s no secret that IBM has become the standard for PC software. But maybe
MAD-1 specification: 80186
true 16-bit processor with
256KB memory (expandable
to 512 KB). Disks: two
360KB 5.25-inch floppy
drives. Optional 10MB hard
disk. IBM standard
expansion slot. One parallel
and two serial ports. 12-inch
green or amber display.
Colour graphics controller
(640 x200) standard.
Clock/calendar standard.
TRANSACTION FILE
• SUPERIORTELETYPE, ASR
33, RS232, £50 .Unit with two 8in
floppy drives, £50. Sharp PC 1211
pocker computer + cassette interface,
£30. TRS 80 RAM + disk expansion
circuit boards, (needs finishing), £40.
Tel: 01-4510520.
• COMMODORE 8032 SK
computer. 3040 disk drive with useful
software, £750 ono. Commodore 8027
daisy wheel printer, £300 ono. “ Jaws”
64K memory SI00 board, £85. All
excellent condition. Tel: 01-4510520.
• LUCAS NASCOM boards. 64K
R AM, £95. A VC video card, £95.
Lucas EDC disc controller, £75. All
boards unused. Tel: (0234) 852942
(day)or(0234)857491(eve).
• APPLE IIE. 64k, disk drive, Kaga
monitor, joystick, software, books,
included. All hardly used and in mint
condition. Only six monthsold.
Boxed, £900. Tel: Southampton
584487 (eves).
• TORCH Z80 2nd processor
upgrade for BBC micro. Complete
with OS chip and softwear. Unused,
(requires any 80T disc drive). Offers
to: (031)3460591.
• DRAGON.32kforsale. Perfect
working order. Many books, light pen
etc. In original box, bargain at £50.2
Grange End, Smallfiela, Surrey. Tel:
Smallfield (0342 84) 2595.
• ORIC-148k,andSeikoshaGP80A
printer. Spare paper, ribbon, books,
software and articles. Includes
attachecase,£250.Tel: Gosport
520204 weekends or S AE 43 Milford
Court, Gale Moor Avenue, Gosport
P0122TN.
• ATARI 80048k. 810disk drive,
850 interface unit, 1010cassette, with
assembler, communications,
extended Basic cartridges, various
games. All as new £600 ono. Tel:
Newbury (0635) 42436 (after 7pm).
• TANDYTRS80 Model one. Level
two. 32k Expansion interface, high
resolution graphics, matrix printer,
VDU, cassette, plus all cables, etc.
£550 ono. Tel: Bagshot (0276) 74458
(eves).
• WANTED, back issues PCWvol
1.1 until vol 5.8 and PC (UK) vol 1.1
until vol 5.12 issues, complete and in
mint condition, not bound. Make
offer to Walter Quatannens
Melkwezerstr 39 B-3350 Linter,
Belgium.
• SPECTRUM, 48k. Interface 1,
microdrive, Prism Micronet modem,
printer, sound generator, joystick,
cassette recorder, loads of programs
on cartridge and cassette, books,
magazines, worth over £700. Bargain
at £480. Tel: 01-3736303. Noon.
• SUPERBRAIN IIQD64 twin disc
drive giving 1.5 MB; plus Epson 100
FT printer; plus DBase II complete
business system. As new. All
manuals, £1,400 ono. Tel: John
Denholm, Leamington Spa 0926
313695.
• TRS-80Model2,64k,80x 24
VDU, 8in disk drive ,115 VAConly
TRSDOS, Basic-80, business
software, manuals, acoustic coupler
(Bell 103A),£500. Tel: (0624)824380.
• BBCModel-B + disc interface.
Latest model, new, boxed and
guaranteed. Includes57
quality-games and new BBC-books.
Best offer of around £400 secures sale.
Tel: 01-7203353 Now! London-area.
An unrepeatable offer.
• COMPLETE COMPUTER/word
processor system. Video Genie 48k.
Lower case, sound, Aculab floppy
tape unit, green screen monitor,
Seikosha printer, plus software:
Scripsit, Xbas, Jumbo, £400, might
split. Tel: Wolverhampton 341333.
4 BBCMICROMODELB(32k).
Includes all leads, manuals and
welcome tape, £200ono. Also
cassette unit forBBC,£10ono. Tel:
Bradford (0274) 43973 (after 6pm, ask
for Jonathan).
• APPLE He. 2 disk drives,
controller, 80 col, monitor III, stand,
boxes, disks, manuals and other
books. Allfor£l,000. Tel: (0244)
43665(eve).
• TRS-80 Model 1 Level II, 48k.
With expansion interface, RS232,
VDU,ICLtermi-printer, 100k disk
drive, cassette recorder and software
manuals etc, £449 ono. Willing to
separate. Tel: (04626) 4184.
• WANTED FOR CBM 8032,
spread sheet, word processor
programs. No games. McCann, 28
Maxwellton Street. Tel: Paisley
041-6371718.
• VIDEO GENIE, floppy disk
interface wanted. Also disk drives.
Must be in good condition. Tel:
Leicester (0533) 825517.
• NASCOM 2, with 4Mhz48k RAM
B board, cased with power supply.
Nas-Sysm assembler, disassembler,
full documentation, club magazines
and books .Excellent condition ,£180
ono. Tel: Leigh (0942)677244.
• SH ARP 48k MZ80 A. Computer
incl. printer interface, many Basics,
Pascal, Forth, many books and user
clubnotes. All for£395. Tel:
(021)-7049201.
• ENGINEER WANTS APPLE
He, minimum64k,2 x FDM, VDU,
printer. Unused swap items. Villiers
Honda Robin Petrol engines, £600.
Radio spares, components, £1,500.
Hydraulics kits, Westwood tractor.
Tel: 074-9812392 (eves, for list).
• TRS-80 Mark 1, Level 2.48k
expansion interface, 2 disc drives,
monitor and software. Fully
operational at £400 ono. Must sell
auickly. Tel: Stan on Batley478469.
Will split if needed.
• TANDY MODEL 100,32k RAM,
CGP115 printer, stats package books,
manuals, etc, £650. Torch Z80 card,
software, manuals, etc, £225. Target
Plannercalc for Torch, £40. Tel: 0204
694265 (Bolton).
• TRS-80.48k expansion interface,
monitor, 3 double density disk drives
and software. Will split. £350 ono for
a uicksale. Tel: 01-9977578.
> OSBORNE. DD/80col,
Wordstar, Mailmerge, Disk-Doctor,
Supercalc, Supersort, Cardbox,
Datastar, Milestone Mail/List,
Footnote Typing—Tutor, £950.
Home use under warranty. Tel:
Rayner on 01-672 3728.
• MOUNTAIN COMPUTER
MUSIC SYSTEM for Apple II.
Perfect condition, original packing,
£ 135. Also Z80 card with CP/M,
Cobol, Fortran, and Pilot compilers
with manuals, £170. Tel: 01-5272350
ext 52/54 (Mr Bhatti, office hours).
• TANDY DMPlOOmatrix printer.
Boxed, as new with cable and box of
paper,£145. Videx80colcardfor
Apple II. Asnewandboxed,£80.Tel:
01-527 2350 ext 52/54 (Mr Bhatti,
office hours).
• HP-41CwithMathsPac,£80ono.
Tel: 089244607.
• NEWBRAIN AD. Manuals, demo
tapes, and software, £170. Sanyo
green monitor 12in, £75 or £220 the
lot. Delivery negotiable. Tel: Fischer
on Worcs (0905) 620098.
• TRS-801L-2 32k, + 15 A
teleprinter + interface + monitor +
tape recorder + over£l ,000software.
Over 215 programs, many games,
utilities:—Edtasm, Scripsit, Invaders
etc -I- books, manuals. Complete
system, £550 ono. Tel: Birmingham
(021)7482405. Waseem.
• SH ARP MZ80B, 64k, Twin disk
drive, P6 matrix printer. Also
software, Word-Star, Calcstar, CP/M
2.2, andFDOS, £910. Tel: Corsham
714589 (Wiltshire), 24-hour answer
machine.
• SWEET P PLOTTER, Apple
business graphics, almost new, £400.
Microsoft softcard manuals never
used, £180. Acceleratorcardforll
Plus, £150. Last one Apple II, £70.
Tel: 0277228885 (eves).
• TRS80LEVEL216k,32k
expansion interface, CTR80,
CGP115 colour graphic printer, utility
ROMS, £200. TRS80/VG software
from£1.50. Tel: A. Young onOl-669
5830 (after 6pm).
• APPLE IISOFTWARE. Less
than half price! Over 60 games,
utilities, word processors,
assemblers, books, etc. Digitek 16k
ramcard,£40. All with original
documentation. Tel: Guildford
(0483) 69975 (after 6pm).
• ATARI 822.40 COPS thermal
printer. Nearly new, all leads, paper
andmanuals. Offers to Tim Myall.
Tel: (0702) 365150 (days) or (0702)
610325 (eves).
• NEWBRAIN AD. 32k, with psu
and tape recorder,£150. Tel:
Kegworth3465.
• NEWBRAIN A. 32k, including
psu, manual and leads, £140 ono. Tel:
01-5503166(after 10.30pm or
weekends).
• OSBORNE I. Double density 80
cols, CP/M, CBasic, M/Basic,
Wordstar, Mailmerge, Supercalc,
plus blank discs, £800 ono, still under
warranty. Tel: Uxbridge 38230 ext
2298 (day) or 38543 (eves). Mark, Flat
59.
• TANDY DMP100 dot matrix
printer. Ideal for home computer,
£160. TRS-80model 1 series 1 editor
assembler, £15. Richard Partington,
184 Kitchen Lane, Ashmore Park,
Wednesfield WV112HZ. Tel: (0902)
739509 (after 6pm).
• SHARP MZ80B, Twin disks,
software includes CP/M, Wordstar,
Calcstar, Datastar, CBasic. Also
Centronics printer interface, £1,000
(inc. VAT) ono. Tel: (021) 233 3988 or
(021)3514137.
• 80 BVS/NASB VS compatible
video card GM8121 VC and also
GM811CPVcard. Both as new, will
separate, £180ono. Tel: Potters Bar
(0707) 42065 (after 7pm).
• COMMODORE 700 256k, full
keyboard, full screen. As new, cost
£1,195, updated to latest spec, £500.
Part exchange considered. Tel: 0564
824128.
• NEWBRAIN MODEL A 32k,
includes power supply, leads, manual,
padded cover etc. Hardly used. Quick
sale, £180 ono. Tel: 01-9414687 or
(0202)709344.
• SANYO MBC555. Twin 160k
drives, high resolution colour
monitor. Brother HR15 daisywheel
printer, Wordstar, Mailmerge,
Spellstar, Calcstar, Infostar, Basic.
New with ten months guarantee and
full documentation, £1,850. Tel:
(0264)54696.
• APPLE VISICALC. As new (with
manual), £80.16k RAM/language
card, £30, (or will sell together for
£100). Also Visicalc applications
book, £5. Tel: Milton Keynes (0908)
317435.
• TRS-80 MODEL 1 Level 2,16k.
With monitor, UHFmod, cassette
leads, software and manuals, £175
ono. Tel: FullwoodCodsall4543.
• TANDYTRS-80 Model-1.
Enthusiast apprehensively changing
toQL. Offers, ultra reliable Tandy
hardware, programs, books .disks,
accessories etc. Too much to list here.
Tel: Amersham (02403) 3829 (eves,
for details).
• NASCOM248k. Cased, Nas-Dis,
Nas-Pen, Zeap, Nas-Debug, Sargon,
Chess, Nas-Sys3. All in ROM. Full
documentation, all manuals,
magazines, for quick sale, £150. Tel:
Colchester 841293.
• WANTED. Casio FX602
programmable calculator. Must be
good condition. All prices
considered. Tel: Dunstable 603907.
• APRICOT original monitor.
Hardly used, asnew, only£125.
Delivered free, save £70, have spare
monitor. For home use. Tel: Leyland
(07744)23221 (after 7.30pm) or
Chorley 78531 (duringday).
• JUPITER, Forth computer,
interfaced inside monitor with
multirail power supply, ASCI 1
interface with non-working matching
keyboard. All circuits supplied, plus
more. Reasonable offer. Tel: (03752)
5934 Tilbury, Essex (after 6pm).
• LOTUS 123 software package for
IBM-PC, £275. Tel: 01-9946365.
• BBC 32k‘A’. Runs all software.
Partly upgraded, excellent condition,
hardly used. Includes all leads, some
software, games, educational, etc.
0.51.2 several manuals, word
processor, cassette lead, only£299.
Tel: 01-4401635.
• SHARP MZ80K Built in monitor,
cassette player, languages, games,
utilities, books, mags, etc. Or swap for
Atari 800. Details, tel: Tamworth
(0827)872554.
• BBC MODEL B. Boxed with
manual, light pen, joysticks, 15
programs including Hunchback,
Philosophers, Quest, 3D Bomb
Alley, Flight Simulator. All original.
Will sell for £440. Te.: 01-868 8536
(eves and weekends').
• OSBORNE 1. Excellent
condition, CP/M, W ordstar,
Mailmerge, Supercalc, MBasic &
CBasic, TV adaptor 10 diskettes,
comprehensive manual, £750. Tel:
Upminster (04022) 23886.
• WANTED. Any Apple computer.
Must be less than £200. Also disk
drive. Please contant Babis after 5pm
to9pm. Tel: 01-4558854.
• BUSINESS SYSTEM super
Apple. B asis 108 dua 1 processors
128k, twin Apple drives, monitor,
Mannesman Tally MT180L printer,
K * "l ,500 worth software.
-Roycequality machine. Tel:
Chandra on 01 -348 6401 or 01-739
8856.
• LYNX48k. For sale, still in box.
Hardly used, all leads/manuals
included. Bargain price, £145. Write
to: Ian Paton, 39 Y ates Street, Dingle,
Liverpool L86RD.
• VIDEO GENIE, 16k. With inbuilt
cassette recorder. Pe rfect condition,
some softwear and books, £100.
Contact Piers Shepperson, 264 Lee
High Road, London SE13 5PL. Tel:
01-8524183.
• IBM PC Business Spec, brand
new, unused, unwanted, award with
FX80 printer, will sell at good
discount to list price. References
supplied. Call Mike on 01-483 0369.
• Teletype 43 printer. No
reasonable offer refused. Tel:
Medway (0634) 54553.
• Sharp MZ80K (48k)+Apollo
w.p, + Easidata+toolkit+Zen
assembler. All manuals and
instructions £240. Garner, 90 Sunny
Bank Road, Bury. Tel: 061 766 8971.
• Apple compatible ITT 2020, 48k,
disk drive, Hitachi monitor, RS232
serial interface, loads of software
including Visicalc, Visidex, Visiplot,
Visitrend, £350, will split. Texas
Omni 800 printer, offers invited.
Tel: 021 351 7129.
• HP-16C ‘computer scientist’
calculator. Programmable, hex
binary decimal octal calculations. As
new, manual £45 ono. Trutwein,
Tel: Bracknell 483244 ext 120
10.30am-5.00pm.
Mondays-Thursdays inclusive.
10.30am-2.00pm Fridays.
• Newbrain A TRS-80, cassette
recorder, manuals leads and
software, including word processor
and database, £150. Tel: 061 980
6675.
TRANSACTION FILE ADVERTISEMENT FORM
All Transaction File ads must be submitted by readers on this form or a photo-copy of this form. Maximum 30 words. Print one word
per box, very clearly. Name, address and/or telephone number must be included in the 30 words. All ads must be accompanied by a
flat fee of £2.50. Make cheques or POs payable to Personal Computer World. Ads accepted from private readers only. Ads cannot be
repeated (unless sent in on another form) and we cannot guarantee to print an ad in any specific issue. Please help our typesetter to
help you by printing your ad very clearly. Send form to: Transaction File PCW, 62 Oxford Street, London W1A 2HG.
Please find enclosed my cheque/PO for £2.50 for the following Transaction File ad.
208 PCW
ACC NEWS
Yourcaring, sharing Co-op is interested in more than your
customl it also offers advice on computerclubs. RupertSteele
keeps you up to date on club news.
Mr Keith Goldie-Morrison has written
to explain the aim of FIG—the UK Forth
Interest Group. A slightly unusual
national user group in that it is aimed at
a language, rather than a machine, it
reminds me of the 'bad' old days of
mainframes and minis with machine
independence, where you could (in
theory) take a program written for one
machine and run it unchanged on
another. With micros this is largely
impossible (particularly with the cheap
home machines). The group promotes
its own implementation of the lan¬
guage 'not so much a language as a
complete tool kit for managing a
computer'.
FIG Forth documentation, listings
and club magazine are available to
members for £7 in addition to the £7pa
membership fee. For more details,
write to Keith (enclosing an sae) at
Bradden Old Rectory, Towcester,
Northants, NN12 8ED.
The Co-operative Society is running a
number of computer clubs throughout
the country. ROYCOM in Woolwich,
London is run by John Mileham. The
club also has contacts with Computer-
Town UK!. Write to ROYCOM, Educa¬
tion Dept, RACS, Ltd, 147 Powis Street,
Woolwich, London, SE18 6JN.
Many thanks to Richard Lown, secret¬
ary of the Colchester Sinclair User
Group, for sending me a copy of his
club's first newsletter. It includes two
reviews, one of software (Psion's
'Scrabble') and one of hardware ('The
Contact Lens' — a lens claimed to
improve the visibility of the ZX81
keyboard). It also contains some local
news, including the address of a new
computer shop, and some 'diary dates'
for computer club members. Since the
club holds meetings as well, it looks
most interesting. Contact Colchester
Sinclair User Group, c/o 102 Prettygate
Road, Colchester on Colchester 561066.
Attention NewBrain users! There is a
competition in NewBrain User Groups
(you may recall I mentioned INgroup
some months ago). Now we
have NewBrain Users Group, GFG
Microsystems, 36 Armitage Way, Cam¬
bridge CB4 2UE. Try them both and
choose. Also of interest may be the
Dutch NewBrain UserGroup, which has
sent me a detailed letter in which it asks
if anybody is running an amateur user
group. The group is also collecting
names of people who would like to join
a really independent NewBrain User
Group. Anyone interested should send
£1 to cover costs, with their name,
address, phone number, main areas of
interest, languages used, and so on.
Any surplus money will be donated to
the first really independent NewBrain
User Group with over 200 members.
Write to Rob van Albada, secretary,
NewBrain Gebruikersgroep, Talmas-
traat 20, 1073 JX Amsterdam, Nether¬
lands, for the information.
MrNorman Wrightwritestotell meof
the ROMney Marsh Computer Club.
This was set up as a result of a Further
Education course on computer prog¬
ramming; in which the participants got
together and decided to carry on as a
computer club. Contact Norman on
(0679) 62603 or write to him at 73
Queens Road, Littlestone, Kent.
And a change of address. The new
secretary for the Queen's Crescent
Computer Club is Roberto Campana of
1 d Lady Somerset Road, London, NW5.
You can also contact the club through
Joan Walton at the Queen's Crescent
Library, London NW5 or call (working
hours) (01)485 4551/1312.
Most new clubs are affiliating to the
Association, in order to take advantage
of the public liability insurance scheme
(under which all affiliated clubs get free
public liability insurance cover to the
tune of half a million pounds per
incident — write to me for written
details). We hope soon to be announc¬
ing a scheme for covering computer
equipment belonging to clubs, or mem¬
bers' equipment at, or in transit to,
meetings, against accidental damage
or loss (including theft). This will be
available to affiliated clubs for a small
extra fee.
Bythe time this is printed, the scheme
should be operational, so why not drop
us a line to find out the details?
Remember that the Association be¬
longs to its member clubs: it's up to you
to state in what direction you would like
the Association to move. The Associa¬
tion aims to build up a large and
committed membership of local com¬
puter clubs to take an interest in what is
going on in the ACC, and in improving
the services available to affiliated clubs.
I see a growing number of small
national user groups for the less
popular or discontinued machines, or
those whose manufacturers have gone
bankrupt.
I think it unlikely that any further large
national user groups will be formed:
the mass market machines have suffi¬
cient users that they can support a fully
commercial dedicated magazine. But I
do not think we should, as amateur
computer users, try to oppose the
trend. The most democratic way for
people to choose what they want is by
their choice of purchase.
Remember, if you would like a
mention here, or if you would like
information about the ACC and its
activities, write to: Rupert Steele, 17
Lawrie Park Crescent, London, SE26
6HH or call (01 >370 0601.
CTUK
Interested in setting up a Computer Town? Whynotwrite
forguidelines.
If you're new to computers, and would
like some help and support from more
experienced hobbyists, then Computer
Towns are a good place to start. And if
there is no Computer Town near you,
why not start one of your own? All you
need are a few interested people, a
place to meet and a notice to advertise
the meetings. A set of guidelines to
assist people setting up Computer
Towns is available by sending an A4 sae
to PCW.
COMPUTER TOWN UK! CONTACTS
ChrisWoodford
31 Hopley Road
Anslow
Burton-on-Trent
Staffordshire
AlanHooley
21 Brammay Drive
Tottington
Bury BL83HS
Peter JKiff
2RanelaghGrove
St Peter's in Thanet
Broadstairs
KentCT102TE
John Byfield
Moonrakers
TheRutts
Bushey Heath
Herts WD21LH
Peter Earthy
46 High Street
Church Stretton
Shropshire SY66BX
Brigitte Gordon
18 Purbright Crescent
New Addington
Croydon CR0 0RT
PCW 209
Vernon Gifford
111 SelhurstRoad
Croydon
LondonSE256LH
Derek Moody
2 Victoria Terrace
Dorchester
Dorset DTI 1LS
JO Dale
12 Poplar Road
Newtown
Powys SY16 2QS
Ray Skinner
22 Colsterdale Close
High Grange
Billingham
Cleveland
KeithTaylor
Carter Hydraulic Works
Thornbury
Bradford BD38HG
PeterHerring
OrdnanceRoad Library
Ordnance Road
Enfield
Middx
JohnStephen Bone
2Claremont Place
Gateshead
Tyne & Wear N E81TL
BJCandy
90akwood Drive
GloucesterGI33JF
MikeSones
Gayton Library
Gayton Road
Harrow
Middx
John Barton
Ashford Main Library
Church Road
Ashford
Kent
AndrewHolyer
lOMasonsRoad
ManningsHeath
Horsham
SussexRH136JP
Robin Bradbeer
Polytechnicof
North London
Holloway Road
London N7
TedEllerton
25Beachdale
WinchmoreHill
London N21
John Mileham
RACS
147 Powis Street
LondonSE186JN
Vernon Quaintance
50 Beatrice Avenue
Norbury
London SW16 4UN
JG Batch
Central Library
Clapham Road
Lowestoft N R32 1 DR
BrianTaylor
22 Millbrook
Leybourne
NrMaidstone
KentME195QJ
AndrewStoneman
135 Birchdale Avenue
Newcastle-Upon-Tyne
EN Ryan
15QueensSquare
Eastwood
Nottingham NG163BJ
Derek Knight or
Bob Carter
Rayners Lane Library
Imperial Drive
RaynersLane
Middx
PatrickColley
52Queensway
Caversham Park
Village
Reading
Berks RG40SI
Bill Gibbings
2LongholmeRoad
Retford
Notts DN226TU
ChrisCooper
IIOChurchRoad
Hanwell
London W7
J M AKilburn
(Headmaster)
Shawfield Norden
Community Middle
School
Shawfield Lane
Norden
RochdaleL127QR
Philip Joy
130RushGreenRoad
Romford
Essex
R Shipton
17 Woodlands Avenue
Eastcote
Ruislip
Middx
Paul Maddison
Gardenways
Chilworth
SouthamptonSOI 7JH
RogerShears
181 Woodmill Lane
BitternePark
Southampton S024PY
Richard Powell
22 Downham Court
SouthShields
Tyne&Wear
Mike Perry, Steve
Collas or Dave Lee
The Library
Ealing Road
Wembley
Middx HA0 4BR
Alan Potten
14 Foxmede
Rivenhall End
Witham
Essex
Alan Sutcliffe
4 Binfield Road
Wokingham
Berks RG11 1SL
Peter Stone or
P Strangman
Computing and Maths
Dept
The Polytechnic
Wulfruna Street
WV1 1LY
TonyCartmell
54 Foregate Street
WorcesterWR11DX
Martin Haugh
Hayes Library
Golden Crescent
Hayes
Middx
RLSaunders
14StNicholasMount
Hemel Hempstead
Herts
Computer Town UK! is a rapidly expanding network of computer
literacy centres where members of the public are given free access to
allsortsofcomputerequipment. This is courtesy of those willing to
offer time/resources. You can find a Computer Town anywhere —
they're often in libraries or schools. The aim is to make micros
enjoyable and non-threatening, so axe-grinding of any sort is banned.
Guidelines are available for those interested in starting up their own
'Towns. Write to: Computer Town UK!, Personal Computer, 62 Oxford
Street, London W1A2HG. Remember to enclose an A4SAE for your
reply. Please don't ring for information as Computer Town UK! is
entirely a spare time activity.
PCW welcomes approaches from
would-be writers, even those who have
never appeared in print before. In this
game it's often those with practical
experience who have important things
to say so we don't mind if your prose is
less than perfect — providing submis¬
sions have a sensible structure and
follow a logical sequence, we can take
care of the polishing.
If your article is already written, send
it in — taking care to ensure that your
name and address, together with a
daytime phone number if possible,
appears on both the covering letter and
the manuscript. Manuscripts should,
preferably, be typed or printed out (dot
matrix output is quite acceptable) but
must be double line-spaced with ample
margins top and bottom and on each
side. Make sure you keep a copy of
everything you send us.
We accept articles on ACT Sirius 1
(CP/M-86 or MS-DOS) single-sided. In
an emergency we can accept stuff over
the phone by modem using BSTAM at
300 baud but as we can only do this
during office hours (10am to 6pm) it's
not exactly a cheap way of getting your
article to us! We can also accept
material by Telecom Gold. Please note
that if you want to send your article in
this way, it should be as an ASCII file
rather than as a 'work file' for any one
type of word processor — that is, use
your word processor to print the text to
disk instead of to paper.
Please notethatwecannotundertake
to return manuscripts, diagrams and
photographs, although we always try
to return the latter. We can only return
disks if they are accompanied by
adequate postage and packaging.
If you have an idea for an article or a
series, write us a letter outlining your
ideas. A one- or two-page synopsis
giving the proposed structure, sequ¬
ence and content is what we're looking
for. But before you send anything to us,
take a good look through PCW to see
what sort of articles get published and
to see what style or writing we prefer
(basically, avoiding pomposity at one
extreme and flippancy at the other).
Also take a look through the Back Issues
advert to see what sort of things we
have already published — no point in
re-inventing the wheel.
Once you've sent off your article or
proposal, please don't hassle us for a
decision. We receive far more submis¬
sions than we can ever use and it takes*
us a while to sort through them,
acknowledge receipt and give an opin¬
ion one way or the other.
Please be sure to tell us if you've sent
the article to another magazine — it
would be very awkward indeed if the
same article were to appear simul¬
taneously in two publications! Frankly,
we're more likely to accept something
which has been offered exclusively to
us.
Finally, we do payfor published work
but please be patient! Payment normal-
/yfol lows about 4-6 weeks after publica¬
tion. H7T»1
210PCW
BENCHMARKS
A listing of the Benchmarks used when
evaluating micros is given below. An
explanation can be found inthe Decem¬
ber '83 issue.
100 REMBenchmarkl
110 PRINT'S"
120 FOR K=1 TO 1000
130 NEXTK
140 PRINTE"
150 END
100 REM Benchmark2
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 K=K+1
140 IFK<1000THEN 130
150 PRINT"E"
160 END
100 REM Benchmark3
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 K=K+1
140 A=K/K*K+K-K
150 IFK<1000THEN 130
160 PRINTE"
170 END
100 REM Benchmark4
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 K=K+1
140 A=K/2*3+4—5
150 K<1000THEN 130
160 PRINT"E"
170 END
100 REM Benchmarks
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 K=K+1
140 A=K/2*3+4—5
150 GOSUB190
160 IFK<1000THEN 130
170 PRINTE"
180 END
190 RETURN
100 REM Benchmark6
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 DIM M(5)
140 K=K+1
150 A=K/2*3+4-5
160 GOSUB220
170 FORL=1 T05
180 NEXTL
190 IFK<1000THEN 140
200 PRINT"E"
210 END
220 RETURN
100 REM Benchmark7
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 DIM M(5)
140 K=K+1
150 A=K/2*3+4-5
160 GOSUB230
170 FORL=1T05
180 M(L)=A
190NEXTL
200 IFK<1000THEN 140
210 PRINT"E"
220 END
230 RETURN
100 REM Benchmarks
110 PRINTS"
120 K=0
130 K=K+1
140 A=K'2
150 B = LOG(K)
160 C = SIN(K)
170 IFK<1000THEN 130
180 PRINT"E"
190 END
DIARY DATA
Readers are strongly advised to check details with exhibition
organisers before making arrangements to avoid wasted journeys due
to cancellations, printer's errors, etc.
Manchester
(University) Electron & BBC Micro User Show. Contact: Database Publications, 31 Aug-2 Sept
(061) 456 8383
London
(Royal Horticultural Hall) Board Computer & Role-Playing Adventure Games Exbn.
Contact: Games Workshop Ltd, (01) 965 3713
2-4 Sept
London
(Olympia) Video Software & Computer Games Show. Coniact: Link House Magazines,
(01)686 2599
2-4 Sept
London
(Olympia 2) IBM System User Show. Contact: EMAP, (01) 837 3699
3-5 Sept
Glasgow
(Anderston Centre) Computer & Software Exbn. Contact: Trade Exbns Scotland,
(0764) 4204
11-13 Sept
Manchester
(Belle Vue) Information & Technology & Office Automation Exbn. Contact: BED Exbns
Ltd, (01)647 1001
18-20 Sept
London
(Olympia 2) Personal Computer World Show. Contact: Montbuild Ltd, (01) 486 1951
19-23 Sept
Brighton
(Brighton Centre) Computers In Communications & Control Exbn. Contact: Institute of
Electrical Engineers, (01) 240 1871
26-28 Sept
PCW211
MICROMART
APPLE
COMPATIBLE
PERIPHERALS
FEfVNUT
FREE with orders over £50 —
Voucher for ‘Microledger’ accounting S/W,worth £50
Peanut
Computermen
— join ’em
High quality U.K. source for cards, disk
drives, computers and all Apple compati¬
ble products. Phone for latest prices.
VAT add 15%. MONEY BACK GUARANTEE
PEANUT COMPUTER
Unit 22N, Low Mill
DEWSBURY WF13 3LX
Tel: (0924) 499366 Ext N
WZm ACCESS/VISA WELCOME
(“3 SEND FOR CATALOGUE
CP/M FOR
MICROS???
Now your personal computer can run CP/M. That’s
right! Any micro with an RS232 port and a Terminal
Emulation Package can now run CP/M.
The OMEGA opens up a new world to you and
enables you to run any of hundreds of Business and
Recreational software packages, from both com¬
mercial and user group sources. Your micro is no
longer restricted to one or two languages, the
Omega is sold with Basic and one other language of
your choice (Cobol, Fortran, Pascal, Forth).
WHATISTHE “OMEGA ”?The “OMEGA”isasingle
board module which will allow a micro with an RS232
port to plug in and run CP/M. OMEGA has a 4MHz
Z80A CPU, 64K of RAM, 2 software-controllable
RS232 ports, a Centronics Port, 4K Monitor Eprom.
The OMEGA can support four disc drives, single or
double sided, single or double density, 48 or 96 TPI.
OMEGA runs under CP/M 2.2. It has a set of utilities
for formatting and copying data. A disk translation
facility lets OMEGA read, write and execute
programs and data from Kay pro, Morrow Decision,
IBM PC and others.
SPECIFICATIONS
Hardware:
Processor — Z80A microprocessor operating at
4MHz
Memory — 64K bytes of RAM; 4K bytes of ROM
Serial Ports — Two RS232C compatible ports for
terminal, modem or serial interfaced printer. Baud
rates from 75 to J8.4K baud.
Printer Port — Centronics-compatible
Software:
Operating Systems — CP/M 2.2 with enhanced
BIOS and CCP
System Utilities, including formatting, back-up,
system configuration and translation of other 5V4
disc formats.
FRIENDLY, an integrated user operating environ¬
ment including disc resource management, user
command processing, and online help facilities.
Integrated Applications Software — T/maker III,
including Word Processing, Electronic Spread¬
sheet, Data Base Management, List Sorting and
Tallying, and Bar Charting.
This product has been thoroughly tried and tested in
the American market. We are now able to offer it in
the UK.
COMPLETE PACKAGE ONLY
£425 + VAT
Send cash, Access, or Barclaycard order to:
QUANT SYSTEMS
111 Thorpe Road,
London E7 9DE
(Please allow 28 days for delivery — guaranteed)
PROGRAM FILE
The search ison fora new programs editor and until such a
person is installed, I (Tony Hetherington) am in control.
Consequently there may be some disruption in processing
and acknowledging program submissionsso please bear
with us.
To help us deal with incoming programs, PCW would
appreciate adherence to the following guidelines.
Programs should be submitted on cassette or disk and be
accompanied by full documentation and a readable listing.
Listings should not bemore than 80 columns wide.
As a matter of policy we will not be printing listings on
Sinclair paper as reproduction is not good enough.
However do please still include a listing as it's an easy guide
to the length of the program. Any Spectrum programs
selected forpublishing will be reprinted in the office.
Commodore 64 owners should use the 'Brackets'program
printed in the June issue to make undecipherable control
codes understandable.
Programs should, of course, be original and not I ike one we ,
received recently—a beautifulcopy of a program printed in
a book; the only difference being the name in the copyright
statement.
This month we've a wide selection of
programs for a variety of machines.
Program of the Month is the excellent
SP-Easel by John Palmer, inspired by
the Easel program supplied with the QL.
Knowing Sinclair owners, it would be
no surprise if John has started a fashion
of emulating the QL's facilities on the
Spectrum.
Another serious application is an
equation-solving database for the BBC,
but on the lighter side there's a
scramble variant for the BBC called
Astrorun and an original game called
Honeypot for the Commodore 64.
Finally, a selection of useful utilities
include a disk-based menu selector for
Atari owners and a machine code
assembler for the VIC 20, Commodore
64 and PET, which has been written in
Basic.
Games
w
Scientific! mathematic
F
Business
fF
Toolkit! utilities
p3
Educational! Computer
Aided Learning
Program of the month
Spectrum SP-Easel
by John Palmer
'SP-Easel' is a business graphics prog¬
ram inspired by the QL program of the
same name. It allows the user to enter
up to three sets of data with up to 12
items in each, and represent that data
by bar graph, line graph or pie chart.
The bar and line graphs allow you to
graph the sets of data individually or in
any combination. With the bar graph,
the third data number entered is drawn
by a line due to the Spectrum's limiting
display. Depending on how the data
overlaps, the best results may be
obtained by entering the data in a
different order. The pie chart gives you
the option to have a segment highlight¬
ed by pulling that slice away from the
pie (see diagrams with listing).
All input isformatted on the screen as
it's typed; the DELETE key is operation¬
al on all input and CAPS LOCK on the
General Format option. A yellow back¬
ground on input ensures that the user
does not lose track of what he's
inputting, and ENTER should be press¬
ed when an item has been typed. The
General Format year option allows the
data to be labelled by months and asks
for the starting month number: that is,
'1' gives January to December.
The listing contains some short
machine code routines in lines 8000 to
8195. The first of these draws the bars
on the bar graph, as this would take far
212 PCW
PROGRAM FILE
too long In Basic. The second draws the
lines and is a virtual copy of the ROM
routine, exceptthat it allowsa stepto be
added so that dotted lines can be
drawn. The final routine shifts the
numbers on the x axis right four pixels
so that they line up neatly with the
graph.
The remaining code makes up the
January to December labels as there is
insufficient room on the screen for
normal characters to be used. The
listing contains a checksum to detect
errors in the machine code entries, but
readers are advised to save the prog¬
ram before running to avoid a program
crash.
When the program runssuccessfully,
the waiting while the machine code is
POKEd in can be avoided by changing
line 10 to LOAD" "CODE, deleting lines
8000 to 8195 and then saving the
program with:
SAVE "SP-EASEL" LINE 10: SAVE
"Easel MC" CODE 60000, 460.
Note: The two dashes and dot atthe end
of line 50 are user-defined graphics and
are created by substituting graphics A B
C in that order.
10 GD SUB 8000
20 LET n=0: LET month=0
30 LET t*="Tit le": LET s*="": LET x*="x axis": LET y»="y axis"
40 POKE 23658,0: FOR f=USR "a" TO USR “c"+7i POKE f,0: NEXT f
50 POKE USR "a"+4,255: POKE USR "b"+4,204: POKE USR "c"+4,240: LET k*="-"
60 DIM m*(2,24): LET m*<l)="l 23456789 101112"
70 LET m$(2) ="abcdefghei jk j I mrtopqr stuv"
80 DIM b$<7,32): LET b*(2)= "Enter name of data (max 7 chars)": LET b*(3)="Ente
r data or press ’E’ to exit ": LET b$(4)=" Enter required number<s)"
90 LET b*(5)*" Enter number": LET b$(6)=" Enter new data": LE
T b* < 7) = "COMMANDS:M=Menu:P=Print:R=Repeat"
100 LET z*=b*(l): PAPER 0: INK 7: BORDER O
110 LET n*=ra*(l): GO TO 1000
500 REM ********************t**
501 REM menu
502 REM *******.***************t
510 CLS : PRINT TAB 11; PAPER 6; INK 0;" SP-EASEL "
520 PRINT AT 4,4;"1) Initial input of data";AT 6,4;”2) Add/Amend/Di sp I ay data";
ar graph";AT 12,4;"5) Line graph";AT 14,
ENTER OPTION
AT 8,
4; "
3) General
for mat
" ; AT 1
10,4; 1
4; "6)
Pie chart"
530
PRINT 71;AT 1
,0; PAPER
2;'
"
540
IF
INKEY*="1"
THEN
GO
TO
1000
550
IF
INKEY*="2"
THEN
GO
TO
2000
560
IF
INKEY*="3"
THEN
GO
TO
3000
570
IF
INKEY*="4"
THEN
GO
TO
4000
580
IF
INKEY*="5"
THEN
GO
TO
5000
590
IF
INKEY*="6"
THEN
GO
TO
6000
600
GO
TO 540
1000 REM ***********************
1001 REM initial input
1002 REM ***********************
1010 CLS : IF n=0 THEN GO TO 1050
1020 PRINT AT 12,12; FLASH 1;"WARNING": PRINT »" Existing data will be lost by
entering this option. Do you wish to continue? <y/n>"
1030 IF INKEY*="n" THEN GO TO 500
1040 IF INKEY*<>"y" THEN GO TO 1030
1050 DIM a*(3,7): DIM d(12,3): DIM 1(3): LET g=0: DIM e(3)
1060 CLS : PRINT TAB 10; PAPER 6; INK O;"INPUT OF DATA"
1070 FOR f=l TO 12: PRINT AT 6+f,0;f;")": NEXT f
1080 LET g=g+.l: GO SUB 9000
1090 IF g=3 THEN GO TO 1130
1100 PRINT )1;AT 0,0; PAPER 2;" Do you wish to enter anymore data? (y
/n) "
1110 PAUSE 0: IF INKEY*="y" THEN GO TO 1080
1120 IF INKEY*<>"n" THEN GO TO 1110
1130 PRINT 71;AT 0,0; z*; PAPER 2;" PRESS ANY KEY FOR MENU "
1140 LET n=g: PAUSE O: GO TO 500
2000 REM ***********************
2001 REM di sp I ay/arnend
2002 REM ***********************
2010 CLS : PRINT TAB 5; PAPER 6; INK O;"DISPLAY/AMEND/ADD DATA"
2020 PRINT AT 2,16-LEN t*/2;t*
2030 FOR f=l TO 12: PRINT AT 6+f,0;f;")": NEXT f
2040 FOR g=l TO n: PRINT AT 4,g*8+5;g;")";AT 5,g*8+7-l(g);a*(g): FOR f=l TO e(g)
: LET a=LEN STR* d(f,g>
2050 PRINT AT 6+f,g*8+7-a;d<f,g): NEXT f: NEXT g
2060 PRINT 71;AT 0,0; PAPER 2;"COMMANDS: M=Menu D=Amend DataA=Add data P=Prin
t N=Amend Name"
2070 PAUSE O: LET i♦=*INKEY*
2080 IF i*="m" THEN GO TO 500
2090 IF i*="d" THEN GO TO 2200
2100 IF i*="a" THEN GO TO 2300
2110 IF i*="p" THEN COPY
2120 IF i*="rv" THEN GO TO 2400
2130 GO TO 2070
2200 PRINT 71;AT 0,0;z*;z*: IF n=l THEN
2210 PRINT AT 20,0;"column number "
2220 GO SUB 9840: LET g=VAL d*: LET a=0
2230 PRINT AT 20,16-a;"Row number ": LET c*=b*(5)
2240 LET col=29-a: GO SUB 9850: LET f=VAL d*: IF f<l OR f>12 THEN GO SUB 9990:
GO TO 2240
2260 PRINT AT 20,0;z*
2270 GO SUB 9820: LET d(f,g)=VAL d*
2296 IF f >e(g) THEN LET e(g) = f
2297 GO TO 2060
2300 IF n<3 THEN LET n=n+l: LET g=n: GO TO 2350
2310 PRINT AT 20,0;"Column number ": GO SUB 9840: LET g=VAL d*: PRINT AT 20,0;z*
2320 PRINT 71;AT 0,0; PAPER 2;" Data , ";g;" f will be overwritten. Do you wish
to continue? <y/n) "
2330 IF INKEY*="n" THEN GO TO 2060
2340 IF INKEY*<>"y" THEN GO TO 2330
2350 FOR f=l TO 12: LET d(f,g)=0: PRINT AT f+6,g*8;z*( TO 7): NEXT f: GO SUB 900
0: GO TO 2060
2400 PRINT 71;AT 0,0;z*;z*
2410 IF n=l THEN LET g=l: GO TO 2440
2420 PRINT AT 20,0;"column number "
2430 GO SUB 9840: LET g=VAL d*: PRINT AT 20,0;z*
2450 GO SUB 9830: LET a$(g)=d*: LET I(g)=LEN d*: GO TO 2060
3000 REM ***********************
3001 REM format
3002 REM ***********************
3010 CLS : PRINT TAB 9; PAPER 6; INK O;"GENERAL FORMAT"
3020 PRINT INK 4;AT 2,0;"1) Main title:": PRINT 't*
3030 PRINT INK 4;AT 6,O;"2) Sub-titIe:": PRINT »s*
3040 PRINT INK 4;AT 10,0;"3) Label for x axis:": PRINT * x*
LET g=l: LET a=16: GO TO 2230
MICROMART
-\
data buffers
print buffers T-switches
buffered protocol converters
telecommunications buffers
Formats:
IEEE-488 or Centronics parallel,
or V24/RS232c serial, or any
conversion combination.
Buffer sizes:
From 2k to 1 megabyte RAM.
Computers:
IBM PC, Hewlett-Packard, DEC,
Apple, Sirius/Victor, Televideo,
Super Brain, Commodore, BBC,
Tandy, Sharp, Osborne, NEC,
Data-General, etc, etc.
Applications:
Input buffering (data collection,
telecommunications, etc.).
Output buffering (accounts/pay¬
roll printing, plotting, graphics
dumps, assembly listings, word
processing, telecommunications,
etc).
Support:
We are the leading specialist
distributor of UK-designed
buffered interfaces, with a range
of products second to none in
scope, price and reliability.
A>Line Computer Systems
MICRO BUFFER DISTRIBUTORS
1 Church Farm Lane,
Willoughby Waterleys,
Leicestershire, LE8 3UD.
■ Peatling Magna (053 758) 486
\____ J
MULTIKEY
THE DATABASE KIT
MULTIKEY gives FAST access to data
from interpreted BASIC for programmers
building their own applications.
MULTIKEY gives:
★ Record Access by Key
★ Access by Partial Key
★ Access by Combination of Keys
★ Get Next/Prev in any Key Sequence
★ Over 250 possible keys per record
★ Multiple INDEX/DATA files open
simultaneously
★ Written in ‘C’ for power and speed
★ Complete with DEMO Programs, including an
Electronic Card Index
AVAILABLE ON: CP/M, MS-DOS, PC-DOS,
CP/M-86
PRICE £90 + VAT
for Fact Sheet phone (0786) 85697, or write to
CAIRN Associates Ltd., 101 Main Street,
Thornhill, STIRLING FK8 3PL
CAIRN A
PCW213
MICROMART
PROGRAM FILE
III Business
Machine?
Anita Electronic Services (London) Ltd. are
specialists in the repair and service of the
IBM range of Personal Computers and
associated peripherals.
We offer a fast on-site nationwide service or
alternatively repairs can be carried out at our
workshops should you wish to bring your
machine in to us.
Maintenance contracts are available at very
competitive prices.
We also specialise in the repair of Commod¬
ore, Apple, Superbrain, Osborne and Sirius.
Trade enquiries welcome
For further information telephone or write
to:—
Mr. D. Wilkinson
Anita House,
15 Clerkenwell Close,
London EC1R OAD
Tel: 01-253 2444
TURBO PASCAL
Extended Pascal for PC DOS, MS DOS, CP/M-86 and
CP/M80. Turbo Pascal has the following features:
★ Full screen interactive editor.
★ 11 digit floating point arithmetic.
★ Built in transcendental functions
★ Dynamic strings and full string handling features.
★ Program chaing with common variables.
★ Random access data files.
★ One pass native code compiler.
★ Produces object code directly.
★ Locates Run Time errors directly in source code.
★ Compiles and Links faster than IBM or MT+
Pascal.
★ Requires less than 35k of disk space.
★ 250 page manual with extensive explanations and
many illustrated examples.
★ FREE spreadsheet program written in Turbo
Pascal.
Turbo Pascal is written by Bourland International and is in
no way connected with JRT Systems.
★ ★ Only £49.95 ★ ★
The Creator II and Reporter
Now you can explore the world of program generators
without spending a fortune. Full source code supplied.
(CP/M version requires Microsoft Basic)
IBM and CP/M versions.£39.95
TRS80 Version l/lll.£29.95
Manual Only.£4.95
CONGUIN SOFTWARE
14 Goodwood Close, Morden, Surrey SM4 5AW
No callers please Phone: 0524 381423
JOIN NBUG
The NewBrain Users Group
nual! 1 --- ' "-“
irope
ludi A
UK £5
£8
£10
£11
Annual subscription (6 newsletter, special offers, and help)..
Europe.
Saudi Arabia etc.
Far East, USA, South Africa..
Limited introductory offer
Technical manuals £12 + £2 outside Europe
Beginners’ Guides £6 + £1 outside Europe
NewBrains.£99.95
Complete with Beginner's Guide & Technical manual, mem¬
bership to NBUG. Limited offer.
MPE-FORTH & ROM BOX.£89.95
screen editor, NB i/o and maths pack, Z80 macro assembler,
decompiler, utilities and manual.
Invader machine code space game.£8
and the best graphics game on the NewBrain
Star Battle high speed m/c animation.£15
Software supplied on cassette:
Anthony Ashpitel’s TYPING MASTER.£15
Chess 2 (an update to the original).£15
Draughts/Backgammon.£15
MEMOPAD text processing, wordwrap, etc.£10
Graphics Artist, aid to graphics.£10
MORTGAGE.£5
MATHS PLOTTER.£5
MICROPAGE ROM box expand up to 120K.£34.95
EPROM S/W: TYPING MASTER.£35
MORTGAGE.£15 MEMOPAD.£20
Your own 8K program in EPROM for.£15
JOYSTICK including interface and S/W.£25 95
Games software for joystick.£5
GFG Microsystems
36 Armitage Way, CAMBRIDGE CB4 2UE
_Tel: (0223) 315120/207237_
NO extras to pay. Postage etc free
_ Dealer enquiries welcome _
3050 PRINT INK 4;AT 14,0;”4) Label for y axis:": PRINT »y*
3060 PRINT INK 4;AT 18,0;"5) Year option:
3070 IF monthOO THEN PRINT "Yes"
3080 IF month=0 THEN PRINT "No"
3090 PRINT INK 4;AT 20,3;"Start month: PRINT month
3100 PRINT > 1; PAPER 2;AT 0,0;" Press number and enter details
n to Menu "
3110 PAUSE 0: POKE 23658,0
’M’ tc retur
3120
IF
INKEY*="1"
THEN
LET
f=4: LET g=31:
GO
SUB
3300:
LET t*=dS
3130
IF
INKEY*="2"
THEN
LET
f=8: LET g=31:
GO
SUB
3300:
LET s*=d*
3140
IF
INKEY*="3"
THEN
LET
f = 12: LET g=24:
: GO
SUB
3300:
: LET x*=d$
3150
IF
INKEY*="4"
THEN
LET
f = 16: LET g = 14:
: GO
SUB
3300:
: LET y*=d*
3160
IF
INKEY*="5"
THEN
GO
SUB 3200
3170
IF
INKEY*="m"
THEN
GO
TO 500
3180
GO
TO 3100
LET non
3200 PRINT > 1;AT 0,0;z$; PAPER 2;" Year option required? (y/n) "
3210 POKE 23658,0: PAUSE 0: IF INKEY*="n" THEN LET month=0: LET n*= m *< 1 » ■ pptnt
AT 18,16;"No ";AT 20,16;"O ": RETURN
3220 IF INKEYtO'V THEN GO TO 3200
3230 PRINT AT 18,16;"Yes"
3240 LET c*=" Enter starting month number ": LET col=18: GO SUB 9850;
th=VAL d*: IF months'1 OR month>12 THEN GO SUB 9990: GO TO 3240
3250 LET n$=m$(2,(month-1>*2+1 TO )+m*(2, TO Cmonth-1)*2)
3260 RETURN
3300 PRINT M;AT 0,0;z*;z*
3310 PRINT PAPER 6;AT f,0;z*( TO g): LET d*=""
3320 PRINT AT f,LEN d*; PAPER 2; FLASH 1;CHR* (76-<9 AND PEEK 23658=8))- FAUSE O
: LET i*=INKEY*: LET i=CODE i*
3330 IF i=6 THEN POKE 23658,ABS (PEEK 23658-8): GO TO 3320
3340 IF i=13 THEN GO TO 3400
3350 IF i=12 AND d*<>"" THEN PRINT AT f,LEN d*; PAPER 6;" ": LET d*=d*C TO LEN
d*-l): GO TO 3390
3360 IF LEN d*=g THEN GO TO 3320
3370 IF i<31 OR i>127 THEN GO SUB 9990: GO TO 3320
3380 LET d*=d*+i*
3390 PRINT AT f,0; PAPER 6; INK 0;d*: GO TO 3320
3400 PRINT AT f,LEN d*;" ";AT f,0; OVER 1; PAPER 0; INK 7;z*( TO g+1)
3410 RETURN
4000 REM ***********************
4001 REM bar graph
4002 REM ***********************
4010 IF n=1 THEN LET d*="1": GO TO 4060
4020 CLS : PRINT TAB 11; PAPER 6; INK 0;"BAR GRAPH"
4030 PRINT AT 5,0;"Which data?"
4040 FOR f=l TO n: PRINT AT 6+f,2;fj") ";a*(f>: NEXT f
4050 PRINT AT 18,0;"Data to be graphed": GO SUB 9860
4060 GO SUB 9100
4070 LET f=VAL d*(l): IF LEN d*=l THEN LET g=f: GO SUB 9200: GO TO 4090
4080 LET g=VAL d*(2): GO SUB 9200: GO SUB 9500: LET f=g
4090 GO SUB 9500: RANDOMIZE USR 60000: IF LEN d*<>3 THEN GO TO 4120
4100 LET g=VAL d*(3): FOR f=l TO e(g)-l: PLOT INK 8;48+f*16,36+py+d(f,g)*sc: DR
AW INK 8; OVER 1;16,(d(f+1,g)-d(f,g))*sc: NEXT f
4110 PRINT PAPER 1;"/-";a*(g)
4120 PRINT > 1; PAPER 2;AT l,0;b*(7)
4130 IF INKEY*="m" THEN GO TO 500
4140 IF INKEY*="p" THEN COPY
4150 IF INKEY*="r" THEN GO TO 4000
4160 GO TO 4130
5000 REM ***********************
5001 REM Iine graph
5002 REM ***********************
5010 IF n=l THEN LET d*="1": GO TO 5060
5020 CLS : PRINT TAB 11; PAPER 6; INK 0;"LINE GRAPH-
5030 PRINT AT 5,0;"Which data?"
5040 FOR f=l TO n: PRINT AT 6+f,2;f;") ";a*(f): NEXT f
5050 PRINT AT 18,0;"Data to be graphed": GO SUB 9860
5060 GO SUB 9100: GO SUB 9300
5070 FOR a=l TO LEN d*: LET g=VAL d*(a): GO SUB 9600: NEXT a
5080 PRINT > 1; PAPER 2;AT l,0;b*(7)
5090 IF INKEY*="m" THEN GO TO 500
5100 IF INKEYS="p" THEN COPY
5110 IF INKEY*="r" THEN GO TO 5000
5120 GO TO 5090
6000 REM ***********************
6001 REM pie chart
6002 REM ***********************
6010 IF n=l THEN LET g=n: GO TO 6060
6020 CLS : PRINT TAB 11; PAPER 6; INK 0;"PIE CHART"
6030 PRINT AT 5,0;"Which data?"
6040 FOR f=l TO n: PRINT AT 6+f,2;f;") ";a*(f>: NEXT f
6050 PRINT AT 20,0;"Chart of data": GO SUB 9840: LET g=VAL d*
6060 IF e(g)=1 THEN LET h=0: GO TO 6110
6070 PRINT ?1;AT 0,0; PAPER 2;" Do you want a segment of the pie highligh
ted? (y/n)
6080 PAUSE 0: IF INKEY*="n" THEN LET h=0: GO TO 6110
6090 IF INKEY*< >"y" THEN GO TO 6080
6100 PRINT AT 20,0;"Segment number ": LET c*=" Enter number to be highlighted ":
LET col=17: GO SUB 9850: LET h=VAL d*: IF h<1 OR h>e(g) THEN GO SUB 9990: GO T
O 6100
6110 LET t=0: LET a=0: LET c=100: LET r=0: FOR f=l TO e(g): LET t=t+ABS d(f,g):
NEXT f
6120 CLS : PRINT TAB 16-LEN t*/2;t*;AT 1,16-LEN s*/2;s*;AT 2,0;a*(g,
";AT 4,21;“Percentages"
6130 FOR f=l TO e(g): PLOT 84,76: LET p=ABS d(f,g)/ts LET rl=r+p*PI: LET
*PI: DRAW 48*C0S r,48*8IN r
6140 IF h=f THEN PLOT B4+10*C0S rl,76+10*SIN rl: DRAW 48*C0S r,48*SIN r
6150 LET hi=0: DRAW 48*(C0S a-COS r),48*(SIN a-SIN r),-p*2*PIi IF e(g)=l THEN C
IRCLE 84,76,48
6160 IF h=f THEN DRAW -48*C0S a,-48*SIN a: LET hi=l
6170 LET p1=INT (p*le4+.5)/100: LET q*=STR* (INT (100*(pl-INT pi)+.5)/100)+"0"
6180 1_ET p*=STRS INT pli LET C"_ "fd* AND, q»C4 TO AND q*£ U-" .
(q*(2 TO ) AND q*(l TO 2)="0.")
6190 PRINT AT 5+f,29-LEN p*;p*+q*( TO 3)
6200 IF p<0.025 AND hOf THEN PRINT INK 4;AT 5+ f, 22; "*" ; AT 19,24;"* = not";AT
20,24;"IabelIed";AT 21,24;"on chart"
6210 IF monthOO THEN POKE 23606,116: POKE 23607,232
6220 PRINT AT 5+f,23;n*(f*2-1 TO f*2)
6230 IF p<0.025 AND f<>h THEN GO TO 6260
6240 PLOT 84+(hi*8+52)*COS r1,76+(hi*8+52)*SIN rl: DRAW 4*C0S rl,4*SIN rl
6250 PRINT OVER 1; INK 4;AT 12-(8+hi)*SIN r1,10+(8+hi)*COS rl;n$(f*2-l TO f*2)
6260 LET a=r« POKE 23606,0: POKE 23607,60: NEXT f
6270 PRINT ?1;AT 1,0; PAPER 2;b*(7)
6280 IF INKEY*="m" THEN GO TO 500
6290 IF INKEY*="p" THEN COPY
6300 IF INKEY*="r" THEN GO TO 6000
6310 GO TO 6280
8000 REM ***********************
8001 REM poke code
8002 REM ***********************
8005 CLS : PRINT "PLEASE WAIT - POKING M. CODE": PRINT
8010 LET c=0: LET rn=60000
TO 1(g));":
+p*2
214PCW
MICROMART
PROGRAM FILE
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
8015 FOR 1=0 TO 3s READ a*
8020 FOR s=l TO LEN a* STEP 2
8025 LET a=CODE a*(s>: LET b=CODE a*(s+l>
8030 LET c=c+b+a
8035 IF a>96 THEN LET a=a-39
8040 IF b>96 THEN LET b=b-39
8045 LET a=a-48: LET b=b-48
8050 POKE m,a*16+b
8055 LET m=m+l
8060 NEXT s
8065 READ chksum
8070 PRINT 1*10+8100: IF cOchksum THEN PRINT "Error at line ";1*10+8100: STOP
8075 LET c=0: NEXT 1
8080 RETURN
8100 DATA "1126533e3f2148ea01001813d5c5e508af0B46f578cb7f2809ed4447083c081418071
5a72003041833eb f1f577e57c e6"
8105 DATA 6132
8110 DATA "18cb2fcb2fcb2fc65867d51146ea7b815flad177el08a72029087c3d672fe607200a7
dd6206f38047cc60867 f1lOccel"
8115 DATA 6564
8120 DATA "23c1c b4028050d3e3 f18033e fc Oc d1109ac 9087c 3c 67e60720e27dc6206 f38dc 7c d60
86718d6070408d9e5d93ae7ea6f"
8125 DATA 6571
8130 DATA M cb276722e7ea01101711010179b8300669d5af5f18056841d5160060781f853803bc3
807944 fd9c1c518044 fd5d9c12a"
8135 DATA 6079
8140 DATA "7d5c78844779854fcd34ebd97910dfdld9e1d9c9ed437d5ccdaa2247043e0lOf10fd4
7e5f52ae7ea3ae6eaa720017c3d"
8145 DATA 6925
8150 DATA "32e6eabd3806f1e17eb077c9f1e1c92157500609c5e506087e23ed670f0fOf0f2b772
410 f 3e 1 c 12b 2b 10e9c 9 "
8155 DATA 5996
8160 DATA "00390aOaOb2al2000010a8a8a8a8aB00003b223b2222230000b028b02828b00000293
a2a2b2a2a000030a8a8b0a8a800"
8165 DATA 5960
8170 DATA "00132a2a3b2a2a000030a8a8302828000028a8a890909000003a0a0a0a2a11000090a
8a8a8a8280000a0a0a0a0a03800"
8175 DATA 5915
8180 DATA "00122a2a3a2a29000090a8a0a0a83800001b2223120a330000b028a83020a00000112
a2a2a2al10000b8101010109000"
8185 DATA 5627
8190 DATA "00112a2a2a2a29000028a8a8a890100000332a2b2a2a3300009820a020209800"
8195 DATA 3786
9000 REM ***********************
9001 REM data input
9002 REM ***********************
9010 LET f=0s PRINT AT 4,g*8+5;g>")"
9030 GO SUB 9830
9040 LET 1<g)=LEN d*: LET a*<g)=d*
9050 GO SUB 9810
9060 IF i=end OR i=end+32 THEN GO TO 9080
9070 LET f=f+l: LET d<f,g)-VAL d*s IF f<12 THEN GO TO 9045
9080 LET e(g)=fs RETURN
9100 REM ***********************
9101 REM scale
9102 REM ***********************
9110 CLS : PRINT AT 10,10;"PLEASE WAIT";AT 12,9;"SCALING DATA"
9120 LET s=0: LET s5=2: LET m=l: LET dl=Os FOR a=l TO LEN d*s LET g=VAL d*<a): 1
F e(g)>d1 THEN LET dl=e(g)
9130 FOR f=l TO e(g>: LET k=Os LET b=ABS d(f,g)
9140 IF b>10 THEN LET b=b/10: LET k=k + lt GO TO 9140
9150 IF k >s THEN LET s=k: LET s5=2
9160 IF SGN d(f,g)=-l THEN LET m=.5
9170 NEXT fs FOR f=l TO e(g)s LET b=ABS d(f,g)/10~s
9180 IF b>5 THEN LET s5=l
9190 NEXT f: NEXT a: LET sc = 12*r»*s5/10~s: RETURN
9200 REM ***********************
9201 REM poke bar data
9202 REM ***********************
9210 POKE 59974,f*2: POKE 59975,g*2
9220 FOR a=l TO 12: POKE a*2+59974,d(a,f)*sc: POKE a*2+59975,d<a,g>*sc : NEXT a
9300 REM ***********************
9301 REM draw graph
9302 REM ***********************
9310 CLS : PRINT TAB 16-LEN t*/2;t*;AT 1,16-LEN s*/2;s*
9320 PLOT 55,36: DRAW 0,120: IF m=l THEN PLOT 52,36: LET py=0: POKE 60001,38: P
OKE 60002,83
9330 IF m=.5 THEN PLOT 52,97: LET py=61* POKE 60001,38: POKE 60002,78
9340 DRAW 195,0: LET x=36: FOR y=6 TO 114 STEP 12: PLOT 54,x+y: DRAW 1,0
9350 IF m=.5 AND y=54 THEN LET x=x+l
9360 PLOT 52,x+y+6: DRAW 3,0: NEXT y: PLOT 52,36: DRAW 3,0
9370 LET a=10~s: IF s>2 THEN LET a=l: PRINT AT 20,0; INK 4;"x";10~s: LET s=0
9380 INK 4: FOR y=0 TO 10 STEP 2: LET x=a*<10-y+2*y*<m-l>>/s5i PRINT AT 2+1.5*y,
6-LEN STR* x;x: NEXT y
9390 IF monthOO THEN POKE 23606,116: POKE 23607,232: PRINT AT 18,7;n*( TO d1*2
): POKE 23606,0: POKE 23607,60
9400 IF month=0 THEN PRINT AT 18,7;n*C TO dl*2): RANDOMIZE USR 60255
9410 PRINT AT 19,19-LEN x*/2;x*
9420 FOR y=l TO LEN y*: PRINT AT 9-LEN y*/2+y,4-s-1/m;y*<y>: NEXT y
9430 INK 7: PRINT AT 21,0; PAPER l;z*;AT 21,0;"KEY: ";
9440 RETURN
9500 REM ***********************
9501 REM key
9502 REM ***********************
9510 LET i=f*2
9520 PRINT PAPER 1; INK INK 7;"=";a*<f>;
9530 RETURN
9600 REM ***********************
9601 REM draw line
9602 REM ***********************
9610 POKE 60135,g*2-2: POKE 60134,0: PLOT 63+g,36+py+d<1,g)*sc
9620 FOR f=l TO e<g)-l: LET y=d<f+1,g)-d<f,g): POKE 60152,ABS y*sc: POKE 60155,S
GN y
9630 RANDOMIZE USR 60137: NEXT f
9640 PRINT PAPER 1;k*Cg);k*(g);a*<g);
9650 RETURN
9800 REM ***********************
9801 REM keyboard input
9802 REM ***********************
9810 LET 1ine=f+7: LET col=g*8+7: LET 1en=7i LET end=69: LET max=57: LET min=45:
LET excep=47: LET c*=b*<3>: GO TO 9880
^LE T L ex cep =4 7*: + t.E T^rV^b* ( 6^T + G(T TO T 9880 ^ ^ * 0 d= 236 : LET _5Zi„LEI_jni n _45
9830 LET 1 ine=5: LET col=g*8+7: LET 1 en=7: LET end=256: LET rnax = 127: LET rmn=31:
LET excep=0: LET c*=b*<2>: GO TO 9880
9840 LET 1 ine=20: LET col=15: LET len = l: LET end=256: LET rr.ax=CODE STR* n: LET m
in=49: LET excep=0: LET c*=b*<5): GO TO 9880
9850 LET 1 ine=20: LET 1 en=2: LET end=256: LET rnax=57: LET rnin=48: LET excep=0: G
0 TO 9880
9860 LET 1ine=18r LET col=22: LET len=n: LET end=256: LET max=CODE STR* n: LET rn
in=49: LET excep=0: LET c*=b*(4)i GO TO 9880
9880 PRINT AT 1ine,col-1en; PAPER 6;z*< TO len): LET d*=""
•
CHATTERBOX II can say anything!
Genuine phoneme synthesis - not just recorded
speech - hence unlimited vocabulary.
Programmable pitch for more natural intonation
(exclusive to Wm Stuart Systems)- solid tone
cabinet for quality sound - integral beep/music
amplifier. PLUS expansion socket for BIG EARS
voice recognition system. Full instructions
technical notes and software supplied with this
outstanding educational unit.
DEALER ENQUIRIES WELCOME
As seen on BBC TV “Computer Programme
*BIG EARS
SPEECH
INPUT
FOR ANY
COMPUTER
Hugely successful Speech Regmtion System
complete with microphone, software and full — - -
instructions. ONLY L49
BUILT TESTED & GUARANTEED
PLEASE STATE COMPUTER UK101.
SPECTRUM, ATOM, NASCOM2, Vic 20, Micron,
ZX80 81, PET, TRS80, MZ80K APPLE II, BBC MICRO, CBM 64
ZX81/SPECTRUM
MUSIC SYNTHESISER (Stereo)
+ 16 LINE CONTROL PORT
Play 3-part music, sound effects, drums etc Full
control of attack, decay and frequency
Input/Output lines provide control and monitor
facility for Home Security, Robot Control, Model
Railway etc etc. Works with or without 16K RAM
Full instructions software included amazinp vai hf
Add keyboard to make a live performance
polyphonic synthesiser!
Note up to 3 units can be used simultaneously. £19.50 (kit)
giving 9 music channels & 48 10 lines E25.50 (BUILT)
f THE COMPOSER
Synthesiser Music
Programme
Enter & play 3 part harmony
Includes demonstrations _
I (Spectrum ZX81 (recommended £71
r TALKING HANGMAN
For CnatterOox 1 A ^
The classic game JDL
claims ns victims ( . 1
with a dry vocai 1 4'"* 1
accompaniment (Spectrum) £6 I
[ZX ARP/DRUMSEQ
Fascinating synthesiser
demonstrations Generates
automatic sequences and
plays from keyboard Some 1
weird effects (Spectrum)
£6
[ CHROMACODE?????? 1
Can you oeluse the bomp by
cracking the secret
combination before time runs
out 7 With Chatterbox voice
I output (Spectrum) I
COLOUR MODULATOR
RGB in, PAL UHF out (not for ZX)
KIT £16
BUILT £22
[ Please add VAT at 15% to prices All enquiries
{ Bai clay/Access orders accepted by telephone S A E please
Cholderton
STUART Nr Salisbury
'S’ 1 Wiltshire SP4 ODZ
SYSTEMS Ltd Tel 098 064 235
ADDER
PUBLISHING
WILL BE LAUNCHING THEIR NEW RANGE OF
TECHNICAL BOOKS FOR THE QL, BBC, 0RIC,
ELECTRON and SPECTRUM AT THE PCW
SHOW ON STAND No. 326 (Opposite Sinclair on
ground floor).
ADDER IS A NEW CAMBRIDGE BASED PUBLISHING HOUSE
SPECIALISING IN HIGH QUALITY TECHNICAL BOOKS AND
SOFTWARE. OUR SUPER RANGE OF BOOKS AND SOFTWARE WILL
BE ON SALE FOR THE FIRST TIME AT THE PCW SHOW. COME
ALONG AND SEE US THERE. (Stand 326 opposite to Sinclair
Research).
ADDER PUBLISHING
PO BOX 146, CAMBRIDGE CB1 2EQ
PCW215
MICROMART
EX-STOCK PRICE BEATERS!
COMPUTERS
RRP
Our Price
IBM PC 64K/mono
1988.00
1775.00
IBM XT 256K/colour
4600.00
4140.00
ACT Sirius 128K RAM
2195.00
1700.00
ACT Sirius 256K10mb
3995.00
3196.00
ACT Apricot twin floppy
1890.00
1512.00 |
ACT Apricot xi lOmb disk
2995.00
2396.00
Philips P2010 portable
1390.00
1190.00
Philips P2012 portable
1690.00
1350.00
PRINTERS
Epson FX-100 matrix printer
569.00
499.00
Epson RX-80 matrix printer
319.00
270.00
Smith Corona TP-1 daisywheel
217.00
199.00
Brother HR-15 daisywheel
445.00
390.00
SOFTWARE
Wordstar
295.00
265.00
Supercalc 2
199.00
179.00
Dbase II
438.00
395.00
Cardbox
195.00
165.00
Multiplan
199.00
179.00
Many more products available —
telephone for details.
All items supplied include full manufacturers warranty
and installation. All prices exclude VAT.
Alliance Computers Limited
34 Priestgate, Peterborough, Cambs. PEI 1JA ;
Telephone: (0733)
48423
/mccc-cc/npurm
iti/UGAiice
★ All Risks Cover (incl. Transit)
— up to £10,000 for £20
★ Increased Cost of Working - to reinstate
lost data
★ Breakdowns Derangement-alternative
to maintenance agreement
Comprehensive cover at a
reasonable premium:-
Talk to us before taking a Maintenance Contract
Write with details of equipment and value to:-
Geoffrey Hoodless & Associates
Insurance Consultants
Freepost (no stamp required)
Woking, Surrey GU21 4BR
Tel: Woking (04862) 61082 Answering Service.
C0MPUCLUB
CUTS THE COST OF YOUR
COMPUTING
LARGE QUANTITY OF CUT PRICE
ORIGINAL SOFTWARE,
RIBBONS, DISKS,
BLANK TAPES, ACCESSORIES
IN FACT ALL YOU NEED FOR
YOUR COMPUTER AT DISCOUNT
PRICES
MONTHLY NEWSLETTER WITH
SPECIAL OFFERS
ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION £5
Details from:
COMPUCLUB
FREEPOST
AMERSHAM
BUCKS HP6 5BR
PROGRAM FILE
9890 PRINT > 1|AT 0,0* z*; PAPER 2*cf
9900 PAUSE 0: LET i*=INKEY*: LET i=CODE i*
9910 IF i “12 AND dtO"" THEN PRINT AT line, col -LEN d*; PAPER 6;
TO LEN d*-l): BO TO 9970
9920 IF i-13 AND d*<>"" THEN GO TO 9980
9930 IF LEN d*=len THEN GO SUB 9990: GO TO 9890
9940 IF i“end OR i=end+32 AND d*="" THEN GO TO 9980
9950 IF i<min OR i>max OR i-excep THEN GO SUB 9990: GO TO 9890
9960 LET d*=d*+i*
9970 PRINT AT line,col-LEN d*; PAPER 6* INK Ojd*: GO TO 9900
9980 PRINT OVER 1;AT Iine,col-1en;z*( TO len)i RETURN
9989 REM ***********************
9990: PRINT .> 1 j PAPER 2;AT 0,0|" **INVALID ENTRY**
E-ENTER ": BEEP .3,10: PAUSE 75
9995 PRINT MjAT 0,0;z*;z*: RETURN
LONGUflXT MICRO SYSTEMS PLC
1983 Results
5O0 -
": LET d*=d* r
PLEASE R
= P r O f i t
= O v erhds/=Sa les
LONGUflIT MICRO SYSTEC
1983 Re s u Its
Sa l e s :
Percentages
3flfl 4.34
FEF! 8.00
MR 4.58
. 96
. 67
. 35
. 0 1
. 02
. 62
. 77
. 29
10
12
10
13
LONGURIT MICRO SYSTEMS PLC
-Profit ----Ove rhds-- Sa les
Atari Autorun
by Steven Green
This useful disk-based utility produces
an autorun menu from which machine
code and Basic programs can be
loaded, using only the SELECT and
START keys.
Program one should be typed in and
saved to disk as SAVE"D:MENU".
The second program can then be
typed in and RUN. After running this
program you should select DOS, option
K — Binary Save to Disk. In answer to
the prompt SAVE-GIVE FILE, START,
END, (INIT, RUN) type AUTORUN. SYS,
0600,0686,0600. This sequence creates
an autorun file which will run the menu
program each time the drive is booted.
The menu will now load Basic and
machine code programs (with the
extender .OBJ) without the need to call
DOS. The required program is selected
using the SELECT key and loaded at a
press of the START key.
It's also possible to delete, lock,
unlockand renamefiles from the menu
with use of CTRL and D, L, U and R keys
respectively. Pressing the 2 key will
produces menu ofthecontents of drive
two, and pressing D will call DOS.
•
PROGRAM 1, MENU
•
1 REM . S.P.GREEN 6A, WRYTHE LANE,CARS.
•
HALTON,SURREY,SM5 2RN. TEL.737 2001 EX
•
•
. 57
•
30000 DIM FA*(17),FB*(28),A*(16),C*(39
•
):FOR 1=1 TO 39:C*(1,1)=" ":NEXT I:FB*
•
="D1:"
•
30005 POKE 580,1:C0NS0L=53279:NAME=301
•
•
60:LINE=30170:KEY=764: V=3: H=0:R=0:K=0
•
216 PCW
MICROMART
PROGRAM FILE
#
30010 GRAPHICS 0:POKE 709,32:POKE 710,
40:POKE 712,40:POKE 82,2:POKE 65,0:P0K
E KEY,255
30015 ? "> >":POSITION 13,0:? " DISK
MENU DRIVE ";FB*(2,2):? :?
30016 REM "}}"=ESC CTRL 2 ESC CTRL CL
EAR
30020 IF FB*<2,2)="1" THEN OPEN #1,6,0
,"D1:*.* M
30022 IF FB*(2,2)="2" THEN OPEN #1,6,0
,"D2:*.*"
30025 TRAP 30060:IF R=40 THEN 30070
30030 INPUT #1,FAS:IF FA*(5,8)="FREE"
THEN POSITION 12,1:? FAS;:POSITION H,V
:GOTO 30060
30033 IF FA*(3,5)="D0S" OR FA*(3,5)="D
UP" OR FA* (3,6)="MENU 11 OR FA* (3,9) = " AU
TORUN" THEN 30025
30035 ? FA*(1,1);:FOR 1=3 TO 10:IF FA*
(I, DO" " THEN ? FA* (1,1);: NEXT I
30040 IF FA* (11, IDO" " THEN ? ".“is?
FA*(11,13);:FOR 1=1 TO (LEN(FA*)-6):?
" ";:NEXT Is? FA*<15,17):GOTO 30050
30045 FOR 1=1 TO LEN(FA*)-2:? " "|sNEX
T Is? FA*(15,17)
30050 R=R+1:IF R>19 THEN POKE 85,22:P0
KE 84,R—17
30055 GOTO 30025
30060 K-Is CLOSE ttlsGOTO 30070
30070 TRAP 30180:POKE 752,0:POSITION 1
,23:? "PRESS SELECT OR START (D=DOS>
II ■
9
30075 FOR L00P=0 TO 0 STEP 0:IF V>22 A
ND H=0 THEN H=20:V=3
30080 IF R>19 THEN IF V>=R-17 AND H=20
THEN V=3:H=0
30085 IF R<=19 THEN IF V>=R+3 THEN V=3
:H=0
30090 POSITION H,V:? " ";:IF PEEK(CONS
OL)=5 THEN V=V+1:FOR 1=1 TO 50:NEXT I
30095 IF PEEK(CONSOL)=6 THEN GOSUB NAM
E:GOTO 30140
30100 IF PEEK(CONSOL)=3 AND R=40 THEN
FOR 1=2 TO 22:POSITION 0,1:? C*:NEXT I
:R=0:POSITION 2,3:GOTO 30025
30110 IF PEEK(KEY)=186 THEN GOSUB NAME
: A*="Deleatrfng"=> ":P=8: GOSUB LINE: X 10
33,#1,0,0,FB*:GOTO 30005
30115 IF PEEK(KEY)=128 THEN GOSUB NAME
:A*="Locking => ":P=8:G0SUB LINE:XIO 3
5,#1,0,0,FB*:GOTO 30005
30120 IF PEEK(KEY)=139 THEN GOSUB NAME
:A*="Unlocking => ":P=8:G0SUB LINE:XIO
36,#1,0,0,FB*:GOTO 30005
30125 IF PEEK(KEY)=168 THEN GOSUB NAME
:A*="New name -for=>" : P=0: GOSUB LINE: GO
SUB 30175:XIO 32,#1,0,0,FB*:GOTO 30005
30126 IF PEEK(KEY)=31 THEN FB*="D1:":P
OSITION 34,0:? FB*(2,2):GOTO 30005
30127 IF PEEK(KEY)=30 THEN FB*="D2:":P
OSITION 34,0:? FB*(2,2):GOTO 30005
: GO FORTH & *;
THE LANGUAGE OF
TOTAL CONTROL
Laboratory Microsystems FORTHs — the
professional FORTHs complete with editors,
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utilities, multi-tasking, and extensive documenta¬
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8086/88 and 68000 processors using CPM-80,
CPM-86, MSDOS/PCDOS or CPM-68K.
CPM-80. £60 CPM-86. £105
MSDOS/PCDOS CPM-68K. £190
£105
NEW — FORTH-I- packages have 32-bit stacks
and can access the processor’s full address
space for both program and data.
CPM-86/
MSDOS/PCDOS CPM-68K. £290
£190
Nautilus Systems Cross-compilers — transport
FORTH to different processors, generate
ROMmable code, these compilers will run on any
of the FORTHs above. The complete develop¬
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targets from — 6502, 8080, 8086/88, Z80, 6800,
6301/6801, 6809, 68000, 1802, Z8, 8070, 9995/
99000, Z8000, LSI-11. First compiler from £290,
additional targets from £95.
NEWBRAIN FORTH in PROM — includes
screen editor, full integration to NEWBRAIN i/o
handlers, complete Z80 macro-assembler, float¬
ing point, graphics, decompiler, utilities, and
manual — £55 -I- VAT.
DIY FORTH kits Installation manual — How to
do it, model, definitions, editor. £7
Source code listing for one processor — choose
from 6502, 6800, 6809, 8080, Z80, 8086/8088,
9900, 1802, 68000, Z8000, VAX, Apple ][,
LSI-11, Eclipse.£7
Comprehensive range of FORTH books
includes —
Starting FORTH by Brodie — the classic £16.25
Systems Guide to fig-FORTH by Ting. £22.00
FORTH Programming by Scanlon. £13.50
Threaded Interpretive Languages by Loeliger
£20.75
r -n
Microprocessor Engineering Ltd
21 Hanley Road Shirley
Southampton SOI SAP
Tel: 0703 780084
v_y
ORIC
ELECTRON
SPECTRUM
Advanced User Guides
from Cambridge
For more information write to:
ADDER PUBLISHING
PO BOX 146, CAMBRIDGE CB1 2EQ
PCW217
MICROMART
Do you feel your spare time, your skills and your
computer could be put to better uses than just simply
playing games? If the answer is “yes”, and you can tick a
further “yes” from the questions below then we offer you
eooo’s
REWARDS
Would you like to write
programs for business
applications?
YesQ
NoQ
Can you write machine code
programs?
YesD
nod
Would you (or someone else for
you) type in data, accurately?
Yes □
Non
Would you like to debug or
improve someone else’s
programs?
YesD
Non
Do you possess some
utility/business programs or
applications you wrote yourself
or acquired commercially?
YesD
Non
If yes please give details:.
Please state makes, models and storage
capacities of your
Computer(s).
Disk drive(s)
Cassette
Graphic Plotter
Printer
Modem
YesD NoD
Yes □ No □
Yes □ No □
Yes □ No □
Sundry items that might be of interest (Eprom
prgmr etc)
Do you belong to a computer
club Yes □ No □
Name (Mr/Mrs/Miss).
Address.
Phone No.
Please give further details on a separate sheet
— if you have, or have access to, more than one computer or storage
device of different make and can transfer data or programs between
them.
— if you have some brilliant ideas about any business or other
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Yes □ No □
Please post without delay to
AURAC LTD
la Queen’s Gate, London SW7 5EH
PROGRAM FILE
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
30128 IF PEEK(KEY)=58 THEN POKE KEY,25
5: DOS
30129 POKE KEY,255
30130 NEXT LOOP
30140 IF FB*(4,4)=" " THEN 30005
30145 FOR 1=4 TO LEN(FB*):FB*(1,1)=CHR
*(ASC(FB*(1,1))+128):NEXT I
30150 POSITION 0,23:7 "Loading ";FB*(4
,LEN(FB*));:FOR I=LEN(FB*) TO 15:7 " "
;:NEXT 1:7 "Please stand by. .";:POSITI
ON H, V
30155 FOR 1=4 TO LEN(FB*):FB*(1,1)=CHR
*(ASC(FB*(I,I))-128):NEXT I
30156 IF FB*(LEN(FB*)—2,LEN(FB*))="OBJ
" THEN 30200
30157 IF FB*(LEN(FB*)-2,LEN(FB*))="ENT
" THEN ENTER FB*
30158 RUN FB*
30160 FOR H=H+3 TO H+14:LOCATE H,V,X:I
F X< >32 THEN FB*(LEN(FB*)+1)=CHR*(X):N
EXT H
30165 POSITION H,V:PUT #6,X:RETURN
30170 POKE 752,1:POSITION 0,23:7 C*;:P
OSITION P,23:7 A*; FB*(4,LEN(FB*));:POK
E KEY,255:FOR 1=1 TO 500:NEXT I:RETURN
30175 7 INPUT A*:? ">":FB*(LEN(FB
*) +1 )=*'," : FB* (LEN (FB*) +1) =A*: RETURN
30176 REM ">"=ESC CTRL 2, ">"=ESC CTRL
CLEAR
30180 POKE 752,1:7 POSITION 17,10
:? "SORRY! ":POSITION 5,12:7 "UNABLE T
0 FOLLOW INSTRUCTIONS_"
30181 REM "> >"=ESC CTRL CLEAR ESC CTRL
2
30185 POSITION 2,14:7 "PLEASE CHECK D
RIVES AND/OR FILESPECS THEN PRESS
OPTION FOR MENU."
30190 IF PEEK(CONSOL)03 THEN 30190
30195 RUN
30200 FOR A=1536 TO 1717:READ B:POKE A
,B:NEXT A
30210 DATA 162,16,32,173,6,134,207,104
,104,157,69,3,104,157,68,3,169,4,157,7
4,3,169,3,157,66
30220 DATA 3,32,86,228,16,3,76,166,6,1
69,203,157,68,3,169,0,157,69,3,169,2,1
57,72,3,169
30230 DATA 0,157,73,3,169,7,157,66,3,3
2,86,228,16,6,192,136,240,92,208,96,16
9,255,197,203,208
30240 DATA 4,197,204,240,210,169,205,1
57,68,3,169,0,157,69,3,32,86,228,16,2,
48,69,165,207,240
30250 DATA 14,165,203,141,224,2,165,20
4,141,225,2,169,0,133,207,165,203,157,
68,3,165,204,157,69,3
30260 DATA 165,205,56,229,203,157,72,3
,165,206,229,204,157,73,3,254,72,3,208
,3,254,73,3,32,86
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
218 PCW
PROGRAM FILE
•
30270 DATA 228,16,137,192,3,240,133,76
•
•
,166,6,32,173,6,108,224,2,152,133,212,
169,0,133,213,169,12
30280 DATA 157,66,3,32,86,228,96
•
30290 LO=USR(1536,ADR(FB$))
•
•
30300 GOTO 30180
PROGRAM 2, AUTORUN MENU
lOO FOR N=1536 TO 1670
•
110 READ X:POKE N,X:NEXT N
120 END
•
•
10000 DATA 162,0,189,26,3,201,69,240,5
,232,232,232,208,244,232,142,105,6, 189
,26
•
10010 DATA 3,133,205,169,107,157,26,3,
•
232,189,26,3,133,206,169,6,157,26,3,16
n
•
10020 DATA 0,162,16,177,205,153,107,6,
200,202,208,247,169,67,141,111,6,169,6
•
,141
10030 DATA 112,6,169,11,141,106,6,96,1
•
72,106,6,240,9,185,123,6,206,106,6,160
•
10040 DATA 1,96,138,72,174,105,6,165,2
05,157,26,3,232,165,206,157,26,3,104,1
•
70
10050 DATA 169,155,160,1,96,7,0,251,24
•
3,51,246,67,6,163,246,51,246,60,246,76
•
10060 DATA 228,243,249,0,34,85,78,69,7
•
7,58,68,34,78,85, 82
Commodore 64 Basic assembler
by N Thomas
The intention when writing this prog¬
ram in Basicwastohaveafully-working
'Basic' assembler with which to write a
machine code version following the
same methods and philosophy. In this
way, all the principles to be used have
been tested in the Basic program, and
also, when eventually the assembler
source is completed, it will be possible
to amend the machine code very swiftly
using the latest version of the program
as the software (in Commodore tradi¬
tion!) will be upward-compatible.
The program should be suitable for
use with the VIC 20 and Pet computers,
merely by changing line 5640. The
value of 43 is the zero page location of
start of Basic pointer on the 64 and
should be changed to the relevant
number for the computer used.
The outline method used in the
program is as follows. The assembler
source code is written asthough it were
Basic code — that is, with each line
having its own line number. Start of
code is signified by a square bracket, [,
followed by the initial assembly
address and then by an optional stor¬
age address (for assembly into free
memory for subsequent transfer into
the 'running' memory after completion
of the assembly process). End of the
source is signified by an optional close
bracket, ]. The source code can be
located anywhere, but from line 6000
on is obviously most suitable.
The assembler uses standard 6502
mnemonicsand addressing mode con¬
ventions, and also includes the most
useful pseudo-op codes. These are :
* = N Moves assembly to loca¬
tion 'N'.
* = * + N Moves assembly on by'N'
bytes.
.DAT Stores the integer value
'N' in one byte if N<256,
and in two bytes (lo-hi) if
N>255.
.TXT'ABC' Stores the ASCII codes for
the text between the sing¬
le quotes in the order in
which it appears.
So-called 'variables' and labels are
dealt with in a manner slightly different
from most assemblers. Variables are
assigned by superseding the variable
name by a colon, for example:
120 :VARIAB=$FFD2 :COMMENT.
Note that the colon must be the first
character on the line. Labels are more
unusual in that they appear as the last
word on the line and include a trailing
FORTRAN
SUBROUTINE
LIBRARY
118 routines featuring:
Sorting and searching
Interpolation and curve fitting
Roots of non-linear equations
Solutions of ordinary differential equations
Fourier transforms (including real-to-complex FFT)
Correlation and convolution (time and frequency domain
methods)
Integration and differentiation
Time-series analysis
Basic statistics
Vector and matrix processing
The package contains the full source code
(diskette and listings) plus documentation which
includes an example run of each routine.
Full details from:
ECHO EXPLORATION
CONSULTANTS LTD.
51 River Meads Avenue, Twickenham,
Middlesex TW2 5JL
READ & PRINT
BAR-CODES USING
ANY COMPUTER
mJbi
Bar-codes give a speedy and
error free means of data entry
and provide a foolproof method
of identification for any item or
document. Typical uses include
stock control, libraries, filing systems, security and checkpoint verification,
point of sale terminals, spare parts identification, etc, etc. Already most
grocery products are bar-coded at source and many other areas of industry
and commerce are following. Bar-codes will soon be commonplace.
Altek decoding algorithms have been developed over a period of years and
are recognised as being second to none. (Others use our software under
licence, in their own products.) All bar codes may be scanned
bidirectionally, and our decoders easily exceed the industry standard
benchmarks. (90% first time read and one substitution error per million
reads).
All Altek decoders are housed in a smart instrument case with “ink-well’ for
the scanning wand when not in use. In addition they all come with software
to print bar codes on a standard dot matrix printer. (Epson or compatible), a
complete bar code identification system at minimal cost.
RS232 Bar-code reader
This microprocessor based unit decodes the bar-code and converts it into
ASCII for transmission to the host via a RS232 port. Complete with power
supply and cables. Works with virtually any computer. Baud rate, data
format and optional check digit verification selectable with DIL switches.
£385.00 + VAT
NEW system for BBC micro
ROM based, interrupt driven software. Switch on and read bar codes!
Nothing to load, no commands needed to start. Reads alphanumeric codes
at power up and automatically inserts the data into the keyboard buffer so it
is possible to control the computer entirely via barcodes! Decodes ALL these
formats: EAN13, EAN8, UPC-A, CODE-39 & INTERLEAVE 2/5. As supplied
to Acorn. £249.00 +VAT
CBM/PET & APPLE 2
Lowest cost system. Disk based software decodes the bar code format of
your choice and is easily interfaced to BASIC or Assembler. A full
specification bar code identification system as used by many private and
public sector laboratories, industrial and commercial organisations.
£199.0+VAT
(Not suitable for Apple running CP/M . . .
Use RS232 system!) Phone or write for
further details. Please state area of
interest and what computer is to be
used. We are also franchised
distributors of Systel bar-code
products and wands in the
UK.
ALTEK
INSTRUMENTS
Enterprise House
44-46 Terrace Road
Walton-on-Thames, Surrey
KT12 2SD
Tel: (0932)244110
Telex: 295800 CWAOL
PCW219
KINGSLEY
ENTERPRISES
Specialists in all kinds of floppy diskettes
Mail Order Discs
Prices are for boxes of 10 discs
Soft Sector
Nashua Xidex
5 25" Diskettes
Dysan
CenTech
SS/SD48
15.00
SS/DD48
16.00
18.00
19.00
19.00
DS/DD48
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SS/DD96
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DS/DD96
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33.00
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SS/SD 48
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SS/DD48
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DS/DD 48
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26.00
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33.00
Sony .3.5 (Apricot) Diskettes £36.00
Post Paid. Please add V.A.T. at 15%
Prices correct at time of going to press
Please ask for details of hard sector discs,
business/educational accounts,
discounts, formatting.
KINGSLEY ENTERPRISES
87 Whitefield Road
Stockton Heath ^
Warrington
WA46NB
-
0925 64207
lor 24 hour
Dial-a-disc service
SPECTRUM & DRAGON TAPE COPIERS
and now MICRODRIVE 1
WE OFFER ON ALL PRODUCTS A FULL MONEY BACK GUARANTEE, an
update service, and FULLY detailed instructions, with USER friendly
programs. Match that!
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with MANY unique features.
MAXIMUM 5 STARS from H.C. Weekly, (just like GRAPHICS and SOUND
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* M/Drive — this extra option GENUINELY copies BASIC, M/CODE +
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* Copies virtually ALL programs. UPDATE service for old customers, to
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MICRODRIVE ONE (MD1)
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OVERSEAS customers: add £1 Europe, £2 others for each product.
Please send SAE for enquiries.
LERM SOFTWARE
Dept PCW, 10 Brunswick Gdns, Corby,
Northants
Programming the
PET/CBM
By Raeto West
The Reference Encyclopedia for Commodore
PET and CBM Users
Comprehensive teaching and reference book on
programming Commodore’s 2000, 3000, 4000 and 8000
microcomputers and peripherals.
Many programs, charts and diagrams. 17 chapters, appendices,
and index, iv + 504 page large-format paperback. ISBN 0 9507650
0 7. Price in UK and Europe £14.90 each (includes post and
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Front dealers and booksellers or direct:
Trade Manager, Edward Arnold (Publishers) Ltd,
Woodlands Park Avenue, MAIDENHEAD, Berks
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Tel: (062882) 3104
“A masterpiece” — Creative Computing
“Essentiar — Educational Computing
“Excellent” — Jim Strasma
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Send orders and make cheques payable to:
Trade Manager, Edward Arnold (Publishers) Ltd,
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Send.copy/ies Programming the PET/CBM at £14.90
I enclose cheque/PO for £.
NAME.
ADDRESS.
J
PROGRAM FILE
colon, for example:
130 LDA (POINT),Y ;COMMENT-
LOOP:
The main reason for having the label as
the last word on the line isfor improved
formatting of the source.
The main principle used to convert
mnemonics and operands into the
relevant machine code is as follows:
MN$() Contains the 56 different
mnemonics plus the two
extra mnemonics .DAT
and TXT.
MN%() Contain the correspond-
ANDMD%()ing fundamental op¬
codes and the number
(from one to eight) of the
relevant addressing
method used by any par¬
ticular op-code respec¬
tively.
MD$() Contains eight strings
(plus one error string) cor¬
responding to the eight
possible addressing
methods. As there are
differentaddressing mod¬
es (immediate, accumula¬
tor, and so on), each string
is 13 characters long with
each character supplying
the number divided by
four which must be logi¬
cally 'OR'ED to the fun¬
damental op-code to give
the final full code.
Thus, taking the following as an ex¬
ample:
200 LDA #$0D ;COMMENT
Subroutine 2100 searches for "LDA"
This results in MN=32
The fundamental code = MN%(32) =
161 ($A1)
The addressing method = MD%(32) = 1
Therefore, MD$(1)="231EE045E76EE"
Next, subroutine 2300 calculates the
addressing mode used based on the
operand "#$0D" and returns a value of
1
Extracting character 1 from MD$(1)
gives 2
Thefinal op-code = ($A1) or (2*4) = $A9
The total length of the instruction is
extracted from IL$ which is in terms of
the 13 addressing modes
If the operand is a variable or label,
the source is searched for a variable of
the same name and, if found, the
variable is evaluated. If it's not found,
then it's assumed to be a label and this is
evaluated on the final pass of the
assembler.
The length of the instruction is stored
in the end-of-line byte of the line of
source (normally zero). When the final
assembly pass is calculating the label
addresses, it sums these values so that
no recalculation is necessary. Finally,
on completion of the assembly (or on an
error) the source code end-of-line bytes
are reset back to zero.
It should be noted that if the assembly
is halted for any reason, this tidying-up
process should be forced by typing
GOTO 3910.
The program as it stands can be
rather slow at assembling long source
files with many labels. The process can
quite easily be speeded up by replacing
the label search routine by equivalent
machine code. The example source
appended to the program shows a
possible method of searching for the
start of the source and this operates
virtually instantaneously.
0 = = = = = : GOTO110 ==BRSIC ASSEMBLER = =•= = =
1 - : N. THOMAS 1984= = '
2 -
3
4 *
5 :
100 —SPECIAL FUNCTIONS—
110 DEF FNA< X >*9#INT< < X-48 V16)+X-I NT< X/16 >* 16
120 DEF FNB<X>X+48-7*<X>9 AND X<16)
130 DEF FNC<X)*PEEK<X)+256*PEEK<X+1>
140
150 PRINT" BASIC ASSEMBLER"
160 PRINT GOTO 5710
190
200
1000 -GET-
1010 E*1 : IF PT+Y+2 S FNC< PT) THEN RETURN
1020 Y=Y+1=C=PEEK<PT+Y> = C$=CHR$< C)
1030 IF C$=" " OR C$='V THEN E=2 =RETURN
1040 IF 0127 THENC$ = KW$<C AND 127)
1050 E*© : RETURN
1060 .
1100 —WORD-
1110 WD$=" H
1120 GOSUB 1010= IF EO0 THEN RETURN
1130 IF C-32 THEN 1150
1140 WD$*=WD<+C$ = GOTO 1120
1150 IF 032 THEN GOSUB 1010 GOTO 1150
1160 Y=Y-1:RETURN
1170 .
1200 -HEX-
1210 K$=""=IF K>255 THEN RETURN
1220 K1 S INT<K/16)
1230 K**CHR*<FNB<K1>)
1240 K1*K-K1*16
1250 K*«K$+CHR$< FNB<K1))
1260 RETURN
1270 .
1300 —DOUBLE-HEX—
1310 K=INT<A/256)
220 PCW
PROGRAM FILE
1320 GOSUB 1210 ; NS-KS
1330 K=fl-256*K
1340 GOSUB 1210 : H$*N$+KS
1350 RETURN
1360 .
1400 --PRINTLINE-
1410 P$=RIGHT$< " "+STRSC FNCC PT+2 > >, 5 )
1420 L*0 : GOSUB 1810 : RETURN
1430 .
1500 —PRINT-RND-STORE—
1510 GOSUB 1210'PS=K*
1520 '
1530 IF LB>127 THEN LF-LF+1
1540 IF LF>1 THEN PS*"**"
1550 GOSUB 1810
1560 POKE S,K : REM -STORE-
1570 A=A+1 : S=S+1
1580 RETURN
1590 .
1600 -END-
1610 E«1
1620 IF FNC< FNC< PT))-0 THEN E-2
1630 IF PEEK<FNC<PTH4)«ASCC"r>THEN E-2
1640 RETURN
1650 .
1700 —PRINT-RDDRESS—
1710 GOSUB 1310
1720 PS*" 1 "+NSG0SU8 1810
1730 L-L+6 : RETURN
1740 .
1800 —PRINT-
1810 l-L+LENCW*
1820 PRINT PS;
1830 IF DV<>0 THEN PRINTSDV, Pti
1840 RETURN
1850 .
1900 —NUMBER-
1910 N*0
1920 IF LEFTSCNS,1)*"S" THEN 1960
1930 IF LEFT*NS, 1 >-"V." THEN 2000
1940 IF LEFTSCNS,1)-"'" THEN 2040
1950 N*VALCNS)'RETURN
I960 NS-RIGHTSCZS+MIDSCNS,2>,4)
1970 FOR I-l TO 4
1980 N*N+16 A CI-l)*FNRCRSCCMIDSCNS,5-I,1)))
1990 NEXT'RETURN
2000 NS*RIGHTSC ZS+MIDSC NS, 2 ), 8)
22010 FOR I-l TO 8
2020 N»N*KASCCMIDS<NS,9-1,1))-48)*2 A C I-l)
2830 NEXT'RETURN
2040 N*ASCCMIDSCNS,2,1))-RETURN
2050 ,
2100 —MNEMONIC SEARCH—
2110 M0-1'Mi-58
2120 MN-M0+INTC C M1-M0)/2)
2130 IF MNS< MN)*MNS THEN RETURN
2140 IF M1-M0 < 4 THEN 2170
2150 IF MNS<MNSCMN) THEN Ml-MN GOTO 2120
2160 M0-MN = GOTO 2120
2170 MN-M0-1
2180 MN*MN+1'IF MNS-MNS< MN) THEN RETURN
2190 IF MNOM1 THEN 2180
2200 MN*0 : RETURN
2210 .
2300 —ADDRESSING MODE-
2310 IF LEFTSC MNS, 1 )*"B" AND MNSO"BRK" THEN AD*12'RETURN
2320 IF ADS*"#" THEN AD*1'RETURN
2330 I IF ADSO"" THEN 2380
2340 IF OPS*"" THEN AD*4'RETURN
2350 IF LEFTS<MNS,1)*"J" THEN 2370
2360 IF N<256 THEN AD*3'RETURN
2370 AD-2'RETURN
2380 IF ADS*"A" THEN AD-5'RETURN
2390 IF ADS*"< ,X>" THEN AD-6'RETURN
2400 IF RDS«"<),Y" THEN AD-7'RETURN
2410 IF ADSO",X" THEN 2440
2420 IF N<256 THEN AD-8'RETURN
2430 AD-10'RETURN
2440 IF ADS<>",t m THEN 2470
2450 IF N<256 THEN AD-9'RETURN
2460 AD*11-RETURN
2470 IF ADS-"0" THEN AD-13'RETURN
2480 AD-0*RETURN
2490 .
2500 —PARSE OPERAND-*
2510. OP*0'LW=LEN<WDS >'Nl-0'NF-Ni•OPS-""'ADS-OPS
2580 IF LW*0 THEN RETURN
.8830 IF LW-1 AND NDS■"A ,, THEN ADS-UDS»RETURN
254G 1=1 : T2S«""
2980 ■: 1 S*MIDS< WDS, 1,1)' T1-ASC< T1S)
2580 IF T1S»"<"OR TiS*")"0R TlS-"i"OR T1S-"," THEN ADS-ADS+T1SGOTO2610
2571 IF T1S*"X M 0R T1S-"Y" THEN IF T2S-"," THEN ADS-ADS+TIS*GOTO2610
2588 IF T1S="'"0R T1S*"S"0R T1S«"V."0R <T1S>-"0"AND T1S<-"9")AND OP*0 THEN NF*1
2590 IF Tl*43 OR Tl*45 THEN QP-LENC0PSH1
2600 0PS*0PS+T1S
2610 T2S*T1S'IF I<LW THEN I-I+1G0T0 2550
2620 IF OP=0 THEN RETURN
2630 Ni=VfiL<MIDSCOPS,OP))
2640 OPS*MIDS<OPS,1,OP-1)
A J. VENNING
(DUPLICATORS)
QUALITY CGNTNOLLED CASSETTE DUPLICATING
QUALITY G SENV/CE AT COMPETITIVE NATES
QUALITY
Constant Stringent checks Made Throughout
Production.
SERVICE
Despatched Normally Within 10 Days From Receipt
Of Master.
PRICE
CIO From 28p Including Case.
Cl 5 From 31 p Including Case.
CONTACT US NOW FOR YOUR PERSONAL QUOTATION.
A.J. DENNING (DUPUCATDNS)
19 The Crescent,
Henleaze,
Bristol.
BS9 4RW Tel (0272) 623267
TRANSLATOR —
Z80 to 8086/88
★ Single pass
★ Will handle very large files
CP/M 86° £60 + VAT
DISASSEMBLER —
Z80
★ Disk based
★ Labelling
★ Cross-reference table
★ Data areas ready for re-assembly
★ Will cope with large programs
★ Also 8080/8085 to Z80 opcodes
CP/M Z80 £40 + VAT
Software Technology
Limited
PO BOX 724, BIRMINGHAM B15 3HQ
TEL: 021 454 3330
COMMODORE
2001-3000
4000-8000
We have the world’s largest selection of software for
the PET/CBM range. We supply to schools, universi¬
ties, large and small companies, government depart¬
ments, and of course home users.
We also manufacture add-on boards and plug-in chips
that can make your computer more powerful — the
most popular add-ons are our high resolution graphics
boards which give your PET better resolution than an
Apple!
IF YOU OWN OR USE A PET/CBM COMPUTER WRITE
OR PHONE FOR A FREE CATALOGUE. By the way, we
also offer software for the Commodore 64.
SCPERSOFT
Winchester House, Canning Road, Wealdstone,
Harrow, Middlesex, HA3 7SJ
Telephone: 01-861 1166
PCW221
MICROMART
SHARP MZ80A £250.00
SHARP MZ80B £500.00
SHARP P6 PRINTER £300.00
SHARP PCI 251 Pocket Compu¬
ter £40.00
SHARP PCI 500 Pocket Compu¬
ter £80.00
Accessories for above — prices
on application
SOFTWARE 50% OFF
Send S.A.E. for List
All prices include VAT
Carriage £5 per item
WEST COAST PERSONAL
47 KYLE STREET
AYR KA71RS
Tel: (0292)285082
QL
SYSTEMS SOFTWARE
QL File Manager simplifies and extends microdrive file
handling. A sorted directory of either or both drives is kept.
The usual file commands are available, but compressed and
generalised by ‘wild cards’ and defaults. All defaults are
expanded, all ‘wild card’ names itemised. More error
messages than Super Basic! Char size and screen width
presettable. File contents can be inspected. On-line HELP.
And more.
* = any string
? = a single character
<n,>n = a numeric string<or>n
EXAMPLES:
dn7??_<13->delete mdvn_???<13
Delete from both drives all 3 letter files whose extension is a
numeric string<13.
cl*_doc—>copy mdv1_*_doc
Copy from drive 1 to drive 2 all files (not already on 2) which
end in ‘_doc’.
£10 all inclusive
SAE for details from:-
SALTIGRADE SOFTWARE
31 ROYAL TERRACE, EDINBURGH EH7 5AH
MicroNation
Educational and Personal Software
Agents and Developers
★ Have you written a program but don’t know
where to place it?
★ There are hundreds of software publishers
— in this country and abroad — some
good, some bad.
★ An agency is an organisation which
represents you and your interests in
placing your software for publication with
a software house.
★ Get in touch with us at MicroNation —our job
is to help you sell your program to the right
company at the best possible rates.
For further information and a brochure contact
MicroNation Ltd
41 Walter Road,
SWANSEA SA1 5PN
Tel: (0792) 476203
PROGRAM FILE
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•
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•
•
•
2630 RETURN
2660 .
£700 — VARIABLE SEARCH-
2710 P1=PTPT*PS
2720 PT=FNC<PT) Y*3
3730 GOSUB 1010
2740 IF C*<>" ” THEN 2810
2750 GOSUB 1110
2760 IF LEN<0P$»LEN<WD$H2 THEN 2810
2770 IF LEFTi<WD*,lEN<OP*)X>OP* THEN 2810
2780 N$=MIDi(WD$,LEN(0P$)+2)
2790 GOSUB 1910
2800 VF=2*PT-P1 RETURN
2810 GOSUB 1610
2820 IF E*1 THEN 2720
2830 VF*1 : PT=P1 : RETURN
2840 .
3000 —PROGRAM START—
3010-
3020 GOSUB 5010 REM ..INITIALISE.,
3030 GOSUB 5610 REM ..FIND SOURCE..
3035 PRINT"FOUND AT"PS:PT=PS
3040 Y=4 GOSUB 1110 REM ..WORD..
3050 N$=WD*‘GOSUB 1910 REM ..NUMBER.,
2060 PRINT "START OF CODE AT
3070 K*N GOSUB 1210
3080 PRINT WDt" "N
3090 AS*N
3100 IF E=0 THEN GOSUB 1110
3110 N*=WD£ : GOSUB 1910
3120 PRINT " STORE AT
3130 K*N : GOSUB 1210
3140 PRINT WD$" "N
3150 SS-N : S-SS : A=AS
3160 PRINT-INPUT "CONTINUE N OR <R>";Q1*
3170 IF Ql$<>"" THEN END
3180 PRINT
3190 :
3290 PT=FNC<PT) L=0 : LF=0 REM..NEWLINE..
3218 GOSUB 1410 GOSUB 1710 WD$=""
3215 VF*1 LB$-""
3229 Y-3•GOSUB 1010 IF E<>2 THEN Y*3’VF*0
3224 IF C$=";" THEN 3230
3225 IF C$="*" THEN 4410
3226 IF EOl THEN GOSUB 1110
3230 MN$ s WD$ : WD$=""
3243 IF EO0 THEN 3260
3253 GOSUB 1110 Y1*Y
3260 GQSUB 2513
3273 C=FNC< PT)-2
3239 IF CHR.$<PEEK<C>)<>" = " THEN 3335
3293 Y=C“PT
3330 Y=Y-2 : GOSUB 1310
3313 IF C*="’" OR C-32 THEN 3335
3320 LB*-Ct+LB*
3330 GOTO 3330
3335 Y’YLIF MN$<>”,TXT" THEN 3360
3342 IF RIGHT$(QP$,1’" THEN 3350
3344 GOSUB 1110=0P$=0P*+" "+WDi
3346 IF EOl THEN 3342
3350 WD**OP«
3360 P$=LEFT$<" "+MN$+" "+WQ$+BL$.. 39-L-LE! ’■: LB* > >+L£$+"
3370 GOSUB 1810
3375 IP LEFT$(MN$,1 )="*" THEN 3750
3376 IF VF=1 THEN 3750
3330 GOSUB 211G
3390 IF MD*<MN>-9 THEN 4810
340O IF MN>C THEN 3430
3410 P*-" ??" GOSUB 1810
3420 GOTO 3910
3430 IF NF-1 THEN 3490
3440 IF OP$-"" THEN N=0GOTC 3320
3450 GOSUB 2710
3460 IF VF=2 THEN 3310
3470 LB=i28 N$®"256" : GOTO 3500
3480 =
3490 N$=0P$
3500 GOSUB 1919
3510 N-N+Nl
3520 GOSUB 2010 REM ADP. “ODE
3530 IF PDO 8 THEN 3360
3340 P*=" ?? ADR MODE" : GOSUB 1010
3550 GOTO 3910
3560 IL*VAL<MID$<IL$ >AD,1>)
3570 MN >
3380 K»MN5i( MN ) AND MK%< MD)
3590 T$=MI D*< MD*< MD >.• AD, 1 >
3600 IF T$<>"E" THEN 3620
3605 IF AD-9 THEN AD=il : GOTC 3369
3610 IF AD=8 THEN AD-10 GOTO 3560
3613 GOTH 3548
3628 K-K OR <4*yAL<T$>>
3620 •
3650 GOSUB 1510 REM PRINT+STORE
3660 IF IL=1 THEN 3730
3679 Nl*INT<N/256)
3680 K=N-236*N1
3690 GOSUB 151C
3708 IF IL=2 THEN 3730
222 PCW
PROGRAM FILE
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3710 K=H1
3720 GOSUB 1510
3730 LB=LB+IL
3740 REM--
3750 POKE FNCX PT)-1 , LB
3759 LB=0 • P$=CHR*< 13) •• GOSUB 1310
3770 GOSUB1610
373Q OH E GOTO 3200,3818
3790 .
3799 STOP
3300 —FIND LABELS—
3310 P$*P*+"END OF MBIN PASS"+P*+P*+"SEARCHING FOR LABELS"+P*+P*
3328 GOSUB 1310
3330 PT=PS : A=AS : S=SS
3840 PT SS FNC< PT)
3350 GOSUB 4010 : GOSUB 1618
3368 ON E GOTO 3348/3910
3378 .
3900 —TIDY UP-
3918 PT=PS
3928 PT=FNC<PT)
3939 POK£ FNC<PT>-1,0
3940 GOSUB 1610
3968 IF E=1 THEN 3920
39C0 IF DV=4 THEN CLOSE DV
3970 PRINTDN*"END" END:-END:
3998 :
4000 —LABELS—
4010 IL*PEEK<FNCCPT)-l)
4020 IF ILM27 THEN 4068
4830 A*A+JL'S=S+IL
4048 RETURN
4O50 :
4060 IF 11=255 THEN 4710
4078 IL»IL AND 127
4030 Y=3:GOSUB 1110 : MN*=UD* : GOSUB 1110
4835 LB*=UD*
4O90 GOSUB 1410:GOSUB 2510 REM SPLIT INTO OP*
4100 P1=PT : PT*PS:A1=AS *
4118 PT*FNC<PT)
4120 C~FNC< PT >-2
4125 C1=PEEK<C+l)
4130 IF C10255 THEN Cl=127 AND Cl = GOTO 4140
4135 Y=5 GOSUB 1110 : N*=WD* : GOSUB 1910
4136 C1=N-A1
4140 IF CHR*(PEEK/C : " THEN 4190
4158 A1=A1+C1
4168 GOSUB 1610
4170 IF E«1 THEN 4110
.4180 PT=P 1 = P$= " NOT FOUND" = GOSUB 1810 = GOTO 3916 ABORT
4190 T*="";VF=1'Y=C”PT
4208 Y=Y-2:GOSUB 1010
4210 T*=C*+T* : IF T*=OP$ THEN 4250
4220 IF LEN< T$)<LEN< OP*) THEN 4200
4238 VF=8:GOTO 4150
4240 GOSUB 1310=GOTO 391a
4258 REM
4255 GOSUB 1710
4256 P*=LEFT *<" ,r +MN*+" "+LB*+BL$,41-L)
4257 .GOSUB 1310
4260 A1=A1+N1 A=R+1S=S+1
4270 IF IL=2 THEN 4340
4288 K=Al-INT<Al/256)*256
4298 GOSUB 1510
4300 K=INK A1/256)
4310 GOSUB 1510
4315 P*=CHR*<13):GOSUB 1318
4320 PT—Pi:RETURN
4338 .
4340 K=A1-A
4358 IF K>129 OR -K>126 THEN K=0P*=CHR*<13)+"T00 BIG"'G0SUB131A : GO T n 4310
4360 K=K-1•IF K<0 THEN K-256+K
4370 GOTO 4318
4330 .
4400 PSEUDO OP-
4410 Y=4:GOSUB 1010
4420 IF C*<>"=" THEN 3910
4438 GOSUB 1110
4435 MN*="*="+WD*:
4440 IF LEFT*< WD*>1)="*" THEN 4550
4458 N*=UD$:GOSUB 1910
4468 IF N>R THEN 4500
4478 PRINT"WARNING 1 NEW ADDR<0LD"
4430 INPUT "CONTINUE N OR <R>";Q2*
4498 IF Q2*<>"" THEN 3910
4500 3=S+N-R
4510 R=N■LB=255
4520 WD*="" GOTO 3278
4530 .
4550 N*-MID*(WD*,3)
4560 GOSUB 19IQ
4570 IF N<128 THEN 4590
4530 PRINT-STEP >127??" N=127
4590 R=A+H: SsS-*-N
4600 LB=N
4610 WD$="" GOTO 3270
4620 .
4700 —NEW ADDR—
•
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MICROMART
NO GIMMICKS!
NO WAFFLE!
SIMPLY THE
BEST PRICE!
WORDSTAR/MAILMERGE/SPELLSTAR
For
_ _ —Personal
___ S 7 ZZ ©Computer
For IBM PC last few Wordstar/
Mailmerge/Spellstar at
£250 Not repeateable when exhausted
VER. 3.24
Mailmerge only £55
Spellstar only £99
m
topple
SAMPLE PRICES
ON SOFTWARE
OVERSEAS AND TRADE
ENQUIRIES WELCOME
WORDSTAR PROFESSIONAL PACK £369
SUPERCALC 2 £169
d BASE 2 £337
MULTIPLAN.£139
HOMEWORD PROCESSOR/ALSO SUITABLE FOR
COMMODORE 64/ATARI £42.95
OPEN ACCESS £353
MULTIMATE V3.2 (UK) £259
LOTUS 1-2-3 (IBM only) £325
FRIDAY! £159
OZ £259
By popular demand we are able to supply business,
educational and recreational software at DISCOUNT
PRICES for the following machines: A|
Commodore, Vic 20, DEC Rainbow, IBM
Sinclair, Sirius, Spectrum, Texas, TRS
inch.
Please send SAE for full list
Atari, BBC,
ICL, Epson,
, CPM 5Va or 8
NEW PRINTERS & ACCESSORIES
Smith Coruna TP1.£179
Ricoh 1600.£850
Daisystep 2000 .£239
Juki 6100.£359
Rutishauser sheet feeder for Diablo 620.£295
For NEC Spinwriter.£295
Printer mate 16K buffer (Centronics).£75
Interpod IEEE-488 interface for VIC20/C64.£65
Full warranty with prices that are unbeatable, and that is a promise!
NEW & DEMONSTRATION HARDWARE WITH FULL WARRANTY
IBM GRAPHICS PRINTER SUPER PRICE WITH FREE STAND. DATAMAC 10 Meg ad in hard
disk for IBM PC with PSU. DATAMAC ASYNCHRONOUS COMMS BOARDS FOR IBM PC.
PLESSEY PC60 MULTIUSER with 20 Meg Winchester QUME QVT 102 TERMINALS. QUME
11/40 Daisywheel Printer
TOSHIBA T300, T100 16 bit & 8 bit Micros. TOSHIBA P1350 High Quality Printers
KAYPRO 2-4-10 with Super Software Bundle and holiday competition
BBC & ELECTRON
DISKS, RIBBONS, STATIONERY, CABLES & CONNECTORS IN STOCK
All prices plus VAT in UK. Phone your Access or
Barclaycard number for immediate despatch (soft¬
ware sent post free).
Send any other ad to us and we’ll beat the price.
Photographic & Optical
Services Ltd
129-137 STANLEY ROAD
TEDDINGTON, MIDDX.
Tel: 01-977 3498 Mondays
Answering machine after business hours.
Offers subject to availability.
Telephone first to reserve.
PC w 223
MICROMART
PET CONVERSIONS AND UPGRADES
It's here at new LOW low price!!!
Don’t throw out your old 9" PET.
The micro port 80 column conversion board for the 9" PET/CBM basic 4.0 or
upgrade 2001/3000 series machines will upgrade it to a true 8000 series. Simply
plugs into the main logic board, and with a small keyboard modification turns your
PET into an 8032. Compatible with any 8032 software and ROM facilities. Supplied
complete with full fitting instructions, or fitted free of charge at our workshops.
Full money back guarantee within 14 days if not delighted. £125.00
Externally mounted switching unit for above (40/80 column suitable). £15.00
12" VOU (FAT 40) 8 column conversion. £82.00
40-80 column switchable (two machines in one!). £98.00
Full keyboard functions: ie TAB, ESC, REPEAT, SCROLL, up/down, DEFINE,
WINDOW, LOWER CASE/GRAPHIC MODE AND DELETE ROM/2 "Cursor*. All
available in direct or program mode.
Any micro port converted machine is also upgradable to 8086 specification with our
64K add on board £250.00.
MEMORY UPGRADES
WHILE-U-WAIT conversion (Dynamic RAM PETS only).
Memory expansion: 8K-32K : £53.90
16K-32K from £43.80, 8k-16K £34.40.
CBM 64 QUALITY SOFTWARE
If you own a PET system with disk or printer and have added a Commodore 64, then
why not use your PET as an interface for the 64? SIPOD is a IEEE to parallel IEEE
• -- “"’s disk drives, printer, plotters, modems etc
is consumed within the 64 as SIPOD loads
i supplied complete with interface, lead and
instructions £29.00
PRINT LINK 64
Interfaces a 64 directly to any printer with centronics input. The printer will respond
to all the normal basic 4 commands. Supplied complete with instructions and
interface cable £26.00
WE ONLY SELL ONE WORDPROCESSOR FOR THE 64. WE THINK IT’S THE BEST!
VIZAWRITE 64, TEXT formatting wordprocessor disk or cartridge. £89.00
VIZASPELL64, Spelling checker with 30,000 word dictionary. £59.00
VIZAWRITE + VIZASPELL, Combined package (disk only). £99.00
MIKRO ASSEMBLER, Write machine code with the ease of Basic. £50.00
ARROW, Save and load to tape up to 7 times faster than normal. £39.00
VICTREE, All toolkit and basic 4.0 commands + a lot more. £49.00
ZOOM, An excellent machine code monitor for the 64. £10.00
GRAPHIX 64, Easy to use high resolution graphics from basic. £10.00
STIX, A most addictive and compelling game. (Joysticks required). £17.35
Offical orders from schools, universities, major companies, etc, are welcome.
UK customers please add 15% VAT. Prepaid orders are post free.
Telephone Mick Bignall for details for any of the above at: MICROPORT, 7
Clydesdale Close, Boreham, Herts WD6 2S0. Tel: 01-953 8385.
BUSINESS# LEISURE
on the Commodore 64
BUSICALC is easy to learn, easy to use. It’s the ideal
spreadsheet program for the home or small businesses.
Price was Now only £7795
Have fun with CRAZY KONG! Excitement for the
whole family
Price was P&93T Now only £395
There are many more great programs in the
SUPERSOFT catalogue. Send in the coupon below or
telephone us on 01-861 1166.
Top Software front SUPERSOFT
To: SUPERSOFT, Winchester House, Canning Road, Harrow HA3 7SJ
I have a Commodore 64 Please rush me a free copy of your software
catalogue, and send me the programs ticked below
I enclose a cheque/postal order for £.
Please charge my ACCESS card no.
□ BUSICALC disk £17.95 □ BURGER CHASE tape£6.95
□ BUSICALC tape £17.95 □ STIX tape £8.95
□ CRAZY KONG tape £3.95 □ XERONS tape £5.95
Name.
Address.
I itirc n TT
I pulse!
3 INCH 100K
'A DISKDRIVE+MIRROR
ip Assembled in Britain ip Robust metal case, BBC beige colour
ip Complete with BBC cable ip Fully compatible with Acorn
/BBC DFS Can be linked in tandem with 5 l /«" disc drive for
easy transfer of software -Q- Red/Green LED indicates
which side of the disc is in use ip Includes 38 page disc
operating system manual Includes 40/80 track formatter
utility disc ip Uses standard Hitachi hard-cased 3” discs
(automatic steel shutter protects exposed part of disc surface)
<J|. Additional double -sided 3” discs availaljl^ex-stock
ip DUAL 3 INCH (2 x 100K) DISC DRIVE,
■O* MIRROR 3" CASSETTE-to-DISC utility pTograWDlscene
Up loads approx 20 cassette-based programs^
(10 on each side of the disc)...
+ VAT
Trade enquines welcome
please contact: Gareth Littler
Mark Howard or |
I III L9 , 1* 1 Judith Allen ai
I #111 H Micro Pulse
Division
P+VAT
northern
Churchfield Road,
:computers]? h ; s D ^ A66RD
J Tel 0928 35 HQ
PROGRAM FILE
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4710 Y=5 : G03UB 1110
4720 N$*WD$ ; GOSUB 1910
4730 S*S+N-R
4740 R=H
4750 RETURN
4760 .
4300 PSEUDO OP-
4310 ON MNttMN) GOTO 4330/4900
4815 REM .DAT .TXT
4320 GOTO 3410
4325 REM LB*1=GOSUB 1510 ^ GOTO 3750
4330 N$=QP$•G03UB 1910=N1=N
4340 LB=1 : IF N<236 THEN 4880
4350 N1*INT< H/256)
4360 K=N-256*N1
4370 GOSUB 1510 : LB=2
4330 K~Ni : GOSUB 1510
4390 GOTO 3750
4900
4910 LB*0
4920 FOR 1*1 TO LENCOPi)
4930 K=RSC< MID$< 0P$.. M >)
4940 IF K=R3C< "'' " ) THEN 4963
4950 LB=IB+1 : GOSUB 1510
4960 NEXT : GOTO 3750
4995 .
5000 —INITIALISE—
5010 DIM KW$< 75)
5020 DIM MN$< 58 >
5030 DIM MNttSS)
5040 DIM MD$< 7)
5050 DIM MKV.<7>
5060 DIM MDV.(58>
5030 Z*="00000000":3L$="
5090 ILi*"2321122223323"
5095 UP**"" DN$="" : HM$*""
5100 1*40960+157 : J=0 = REM KEYWORD STORED ON CBM64 HERE ; CHRNGE FOR VIC S, PE T
5110 1*1 + 1 : KW$< J>=KW$<J)+CHR$<PEEK*I>RND127>■IF PEEKCIX128 THEN 51i0
5115 PRINT HM$; DN$; DN$; DN$j KW« J )"
5120 J*J+1 1 IF J<76 THEN 3110
5130 PRINT UP*"KEYWORDS SET UP"
5140 •
5150 FOR J*i TO 58
5160 RERD MN$<J>,MDV.<J),MN*<J)
5170 NEXT J
5188
5190 FOR J*0 TO 7
5200 RERD MD$<J)/MKX/J)
5210 NEXT J
5220
5230 RETURN
5235 DRTR .DRT/9/1.. .TXT/9..2
3240 DRTR RDC1 / 97 / RND.. 1 / 33 / RSL.. 3 / 6
5250 DRTR BCC / 0/144/BCS/0/176/BEQ/O/240
5260 DRTR 0IT/G/3C,0MI/O/48/BNE/0,20e
3270 DRTR BPL/0, 16,BRK,O,0,BVC/0/80
3280 DRTR BVS/0/112,CLC,0,24,CLD,0/216
3290 DRTR CLI/0/8B/CLV/O/184/CMP/1/193
330O DRTR CPX/4/224,CPY,4/192/DEC/2/19S
3310 DRTR DEX/0/202/DEY/0/136/EOR/1/63
3220 DRTR INC,2/230/INX,0,232/INY/0/200
3330 DRTR JMP/7/76/JSR/0/32/LDB,1/1C1
3340 DRTR LDX/3/162/LDY/3/160/LSR/3/74
3330 DRTR NOP/0/234/ORR/1/l/PHR/0/72
3360 DRTR PHP/0/B/PLR/0/104,PLP/O,40
3370 DRTR ROI,3,42,ROR,3,1O6,RTI,0,64
3390 DRTR RTS/0/96/SBC/1/225/SEC/0/56
3390 DRTR SED/0,240/SEI/O/120/STR/1/129
5400 DRTR STX/2/134/STY/2/132/TRX/0/170
3410 DRTR TRY/0/160/TSX/0/196/TXR/0/139
3420 DRTR TXS/0/134,TYR,0/132
3430 DRTR-0000000000000,233
3440 DRTR 231EE045E7GEC/227
5450 DRTR E20EEEE4CGCEE/231
3460 DRTR E31E2EE3377EE/227
5470 DRTR 021EEEEEEEEEE/243
5480 DRTR 031EEEE5577EE/227
5490 DRTR E20EEEECEEEEE/247
3500 DRTR E0EEEEEEEEEE3/223
5690 —FfND SOURCE-
5610 PRINT"SERRCHING FOR SOURCE"
5620 P3*10637 : REM FIRST TRY
3630 IF CHR$< PEEK< PS+4) )*"£" THEN RETURN
3640 PS*FNC<43 ") ■■ REM THIS IS STRRT OF BRSIC ON CBM64 CHRNGE FOR VIC %. PE T
3630 IF CHR$<PEEK/PS+4))-"[" THEN RETURN
366C PS=FNC< PS > ; PRINTFNC< PS+2 >UP*
3670 IF PSOQ THEN 5630
5680 PS*0
3690 PRINT"NOT FOUND" : STOP
37O0 --OUTPUT DEVICE-
3710 INPUT "OUTPUT TO PRINTER/ Y/N";Q3*
5720 DV-OIF Q3$<>"Y" THEN 3020
5730 DV=4 : OPEN DV/DV
5740 GOTO 3020
224 PCW
PROGRAM FILE
MICROMART
BBC Equation solver
by Philip Tudor
'Equation solver' is a novel application
of a database-style program which is
used to store, amend and delete a
database of up to 200 expressions and,
of course, solve them. It will be
particularly useful to engineers, statisti¬
cians and others who regularly use
complex formulae.
The program is menu-driven and has
the following options:
1 Solve: the user selects the ex¬
pression by its name or
location; and is then
prompted for the equa¬
tion's unknowns and the
answer is printed.
2 Learn: the user enters the ex¬
pression and its name
(which is checked before
storing)
3 Delete: removes any expression
4 Menu: prints out a numbered list
of all expressions held on
either the screen or a
printer
5 Dump: causesallscreenoutputto
be duplicated on a printer
6 Screen: turns off dump
7 Search: prints full details about an
expression (name, loca¬
tion, expression, and so
on, by entering only the
name, part of name, loca¬
tion or expression
8 Load: load an expression from
tape or disk
9 Save: save to tape or disk be¬
tween two specified loca¬
tions (to save all, specify
top and bottom locations)
The equation limit of 200 expressions
can bealtered by changing the variable
T% in line 2010.
There is one slightflawthat disk users
should be aware of: when equations
are saved, a new disk file is created.
Should this fail, perhaps because the
disk is full, then no error message is
displayed. Consequently, the program
fails to load.
1 OREM ********************
20REM **EQUATION SOLVER.**
30REM ** BY:P.TUDOR **
40REM ** MARCH 1983 **
50REM ********************
60M0DE7
7CPR0CINITIALIZE
80PR0CTITLE
90PROCEXPLAIN
1OOTEST=0:PROCSELECTION:GOTO (100+<10*VAL(At)))
11OPROCSOLVE:PROCCLS:GOTO100
120PR0CLEARN:PROCCLS:GOTO100
130PR0CDELETE:PROCCLS:GOTO100
140PR0CMENU:PROCCLS:GOTO100
150PR0CDUMP:PROCCLS:G0T0100
160PR0CSCREEN:PROCCLS:GOTO100
170PR0CSEARCH:PROCCLS:GOTO100
180PR0CL0AD:PROCCLS:GOTO100
190PR0CSAVE:PROCCLS:GOTO100
200REM**TITLE**
21ODEFPRQCTITLE
220PR0CCLS: IF P07.= lTHENPRINT ' " **EQUATION SOLVER** ' * " : G0T0230: ELSE: PRINT: FOR
I~1T02:VDU141,134:PRINT" **Equation Solver**":NEXT
230ENDPR0C
240REM**EX PLAIN**
250DEFPR0CE XPLAIN t
260PRINT" 'Equation Solver' has a variety o-f.commands to help you solve equat
ions"'"more quickly and easily. You can teach"'"it formulae, load & save formula
e and"'"it also incorporates a comprehensive"
270PRINT"search system. It accepts commands in.either case. ('ESCAPE' to exi
t. ) "
280ENDPR0C
290REM**SELECTION**
300DEFPR0CSELECTION
31OPRINT'CHR$131;"A list of 'COMMAND' words follows"
320PRINT'CHR$134"1."CHR$135"Solve...Select equation and solve."
330PRINTCHR$134"2."CHR$135"Learn...Add new formula to memory."
340PRINTCHR$134"3."CHR$135"Delete..Remove a formula from RAM."
350PRINTCHR$134"4."CHR$135"Menu.... Print out formulae in RAM."
360F'RINTCHR$134"5. "CHR$135"Dump.... Produce a hardcopy output."
370PR MM i LHkt i 754 " 6. " CHR# 135"Screen. .Produce only monitor copy."
380PRINTCHR*134"7."CHR$135"Search..Search memory for formula."
390PRINTCHR$134"8. "CHR* 135"Load. . . . Formul ae ,cass/di sk to R'AM. "
400PRINTCHR$134"9."CHR$135"Save_Formulae,RAM to cass/disk. "
41OPRINT'" ENTER COMMAND NUMBER."
4200NERR0RG0T02040
430A*=GETt : IFVAL. (A t) >90RVAL (A*) < 1THEN430
440ENDPR0C
450REM**L0AD**
460DEFPR0CL0AD
47OPR0CCL.S: PRINT ' "LOAD: " ' ' "Do you want to use cassette or disk drive (C or
D) ?":A*=GET$:PROCCHECK(A*):A$=R$:IFA$<>"D"AND A$<>"C"THEN470:*TAPE
4B0IFA*="D"THEN *DISC
490F'RINT'"Do you want to add the formulae on "; : IFA^="D"THENPRINT"di sc" : ELSE: P
RINT"t.ape"
500PRINT“to those in RAM or erase them before starting (A or E) ?"
510A$=GET$:PROCCHECK(A#):A$=R*:IFA$<>"E"AND A$< >"A"THEN490
520IFA$="E"THEN NX=0
5301FA#="T"THENPRINT'"PIease PRESS play on TAPE drive."
540Y=0PENUP"FORMULA" : REPEAT: NX«NX+1
S50INPUTSY, A* < N/C) , C * (N7.) , U* (NX) : UNTIL EOFf Y
560CL0SECY
570ENDPR0C
580REM**SAVE**
590DEFPR0CSAVE
600PR0CCLS:PRINT'"SAVE:"':IFNX=0 F'RINT"There are no formulae in RAM to be
savedPt: A$=GET$: ENDPROC: ELSEPRINT'" Do you want to use cassette or disk¬
drive (C or D) ?":A*=GET$:PROCCHECK(At):A$=R$:IFA$<>"D"AND AT >"C"THEN600:*TAP
610IFA*="C"THEN660
620*DISC
630PRINT'"Do you want to destroy the old file of formulae ?": Z$=GETS:PROCCHEC
M&J SOFTWARE
DRAGON Advanced Programmer’s Package
This implementation is extremely powerful and comprehen¬
sive. It can be used on both 32k and 64k machines so
enabling Dragon 64 owners to utilise all available ram. The
complete package consists of:-
1. The language and its editor. A fig implementation which
allows access to Basic commands when executing FORTH
programs.
2. A 6809 macroassembler written in FORTH.
3. The fig-FORTH Installation Manual which contains a
glossary of FORTH commands, a listing of the editor and
the FORTH model plus lots more.
4. Documentation.
5. A copy of the ‘DRAGON COMPANION’
Available on:-
Cassette.£15
Delta Disc. £18
(state format of disk required)
He will also upgrade existing users of our cassette based
FORTH to disc for £6 — just return your original cassette.
FORTH for the SPECTRUM
A fig implementation on cassette for the 48k machine. The
cost covers the language, an editor, an assembler and
documentation (including the Installation Manual).
Price.£12
D.I.Y. FORTH
fig-FORTH assembly source listings available for 6502, Z80,
8080, 6809, 1802, 9900, 6800, 68000, 8086/88, & PDP11
Price. £7 each
(We also have MVP FORTH listings at the same price for
6502, 8080, 8086/88.)
fig-FORTH Installation Manual
A guide to implementing FORTH from the above listings.
Price. £5
ALL ABOUT FORTH by Haydon
An excellent reference book with cross references to
fig-FORTH, the FORTH-79 standard and ‘Starting FORTH’.
This book should be next to every FORTH programmer’s
computer. (270+ pages)
Price. £7.95
6809 & 6502 Macroassemblers
Written in fig-FORTH, these listings require the minimum of
alteration for any FORTH implementation.
Price. £5 each
All prices include postage and packing within the UK.
Overseas customers please add £2 to total order.
Cheques & PO’s to:-
M&J SOFTWARE
34 GRAYS CLOSE, SCHOLAR GREEN
STOKE-ON-TRENT ST7 3LU
_ Tel: (0782) 517876 _
DISC DATA
TRANSFER
Don’t let your
existing discs stop
you from upgrading
We at Word Capture have the solution. Our
advanced microprocessor systems can read virtually
all CP/M and IBM PC compatible formats.
We can even transfer from one to another. Even if
your system is not CP/M or IBM compatible we may
still be able to help such is the sophistication
of our system.
Send your disc, or for further information
contact your Word Capture Point at
Sumlock, 198 Deansgate, Manchester 3.
Tel: 061-834 4233.
A division of Art Associates (M/cr) Ltd.,
Tanzaro House, Ardwick Green North,
Manchester. Tel: 061-273 8751.
WORD CAPTURE
PC W 225
MICROMART
STRATHERN
QL
UTILITIES
Boot Program to
★ Automatic 40 file Directory
★ Single Key Load
★ Single Key Run
Copy Utility Program to
★ Copy complete Cartridge at one go
★ Multiple file copy
★ Multiple file delete
★ Exercise and Format new cartridge
★ Verify Program
Cartridge and Instructions £15 inc P&P
MARK STRATHERN
174 RICHMOND ROAD
LONDON E8
BASIC COMPILER
For the BBC Micro
Turns Basic programs into really fast
machine code. It is very easy to use
and comes complete with full
instructions. Suitable for the Model
Bor Model A with 32K
CASSETTE £17.95
DISK £19.95
Enquire at your local computer store
or order direct (Post FREE) from:—
A.C.K. DATA
BBC Dept
21 Salcombe Drive
Redhill
Nottingham NG5 8JF
Tel: (0602) 262498
Dealer enquiries welcome
GETTING
AQL?
Then join IQLUG, an independent, non¬
profit making users groups for Sinclair QL
owners.
The groups offers:
Monthly newsletter
Free Software Library
Free advice service
Workshops
Support for local groups
Membership of the group is by subscription
to Quanta, the group’s newsletter.
February ’84 — July ’84, £5.00
August ’84 — January ’85 £6.00
For further details contact:
BRIAN PAIN
24 Oxford Street, Stony Stratford
Milton Keynes MK11 1JU
Telephone: (0908) 564271
Sinclair and QL are trade marks of Sinclair Research
PROGRAM RLE
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
K(ZT):ZT=RT
Z>40IF ZT="Y"THEN *ACCESS FORMULA
650IF ZT="Y"THEN *DELETE FORMULA
660PRINT' "Which section o-f RAM do you wish to save (enter locations when prompt
ed) "
670 INPUT ' "From: " ,A7.: INPUT ' "To: " ,B7.: IFA7.< 10RB7.C 10RB7.>N7.THENPRINT ' "Please use n -i
mbers above O and that exist in RAM. ": G0T0670: ELSE: X7.=A7.
680PRINT
690YMfPENOUT"FORMULA"
700REFEAT
710PRINT£Y,AT(X7.) ,CT(X7.) ,UT(X7.) : X'/.= X7.+ 1: UNTIL X7.=B7.+ 1: CLOSEEY: IF AT="D"THEN *A
CCESS FORMULA L
720ENDPR0C
730REM**PRINTER OUTPUT**
740DEFPR0CDUMP
750*FX5,1
760*FX6,1
770*FX8,4
780VDU2:POX=1
790ENDPR0C
800REM**M0NI TOR ONLY**
81ODEFPROCSCREEN
820VDU3:P0X=0
-S30ENDPR0C
^840REM**SEARCH FOR FORMULA**
850DEFPR0CSEARCH
860PR0CCLS: PRINT ' "SEARCH: IFN7.=0 PRINT"There are no -formulae in RAM to be
searched"''PT:AT=GETT:ENDPROC:ELSE:PRINT"Do you want to search for the equa
tion by its NAME, FORMULA or LOCATION in the menu < 1 -"; NX; " ) "
870PRINT'"Enter 'N','F' or 'L' ?"
880AT=GETT:PROCCHECK(A#):AT=RT:IFAT="N"THEN890ELSE IF AT="F"THEN990ELSE IFAT-"L
"THEN1020 ELSE880
890PRINT'"Do you know the full name (Y or N)"
900AT=GETT: PROCCHECK (AT) :AT=RT: IFAT="Y"THEN940ELSE IF AT = "N"THEN910ELSE900
910PR0CCLS:PRINT'"PI ease enter as much of it as possible (e.g. ADRATI for QUA
DRATIC) ?"
920INPUTNT: PROCCHECK (NT) : NT=RT: IFNT=" "THEN920ELSE P7.=0: FORL7.= lTON*/.: IF INSTR (C -t
(L7.) ,NT) >0 THENPRINT ' "Formula: ";AT(LX) ' ' "Name: ";CT(LX) ' ' "Location: ";LX : PX = l :PPI
NTF'T:AT=GETT:NEXT:ELSE:NEXT
930IFPX=0THENPRINT'"There are no formulae with names containing ";NT:G0
T0970ELSE970
940INPUT ' "What name is the desired formula stored under ", NT:PROCCHECK(NT):NT-R
T
950PX=0: FORI7.= lTON7.: I FCT (17.) =NTTHENF'X=1: PRINT ' "Formula: " ; AT (17.) "Name: " ; CT () 7.
) ' ' "Location: 17.' 'PT:AT=GETT:NEXT:ELSE:NEXT
960IFPX=0THENPRINT' "There are no formulae stored under the name of ";NT:GO"0
970
970PRINT'"Do you want another search (Y or N) ?"
980At=GETTPROCCHECK(AT):AT=RT:IFAT=“Y"THEN860ELSE IFAT="N"THEN ENDPROC ELSE98
0 ,
V90PRINT'"Enter the formula"»iINPUTNT:PROCCHECK(NT):NT=RT
WJOOFOR17.-= 1 TON7.* IFAT(17.) =NTTHEN 1040: ELSE NEXT
1010PRrNT*~"There is no such formula in RAM ' '"Do you want another search (/
N) ?":AT-GETT:PROCCHECK(AT):AT=RT:IFAT="Y"THEN860ELSE ENDPROC
1020PRINT'"What LOCATION is the formula <1-";NX;")
10301NPLJT17.: IF17. >N7. OR 17.< 1 THEN 1030ELSE 1040
1040PR0CCLS: PRINT ' "Formula: " ; AT < 1.50 ' ' "Name: " ; CT (17.) ' ' "L ocatiort: " ; 17.'
1050PRINT'PT:At=GETT:ENDPROC
1060REM**DELETE A FORMULA**
1070DEFPR0CDELETE
1080PR0CCLS:PRINT'"DELETE:":IFNX=OTHENPRINT'"There are no formulae in RAM to de¬
lete. " ' 'FT:AT=GETT:ENDPROC
1090PRINT' "Do you want to DELETE the formula by NAME or FORMULA (N or F) '■ ‘
11 OOAT=GETT: PROCCHECK < AT) : AT=RT: I FAT= : " N" THEN 11 ) OELSE I FAT= "F " THEN 1 .OOELS< 109C
1UOPRINT'"Enter the NAME of the formula"; : INPUTNT: PROCCHECK (NT ) : NT-RT
1120F0RI7.= 1T0N7.: I FCT (17.) =NTTHENF7.= 1 ELSE NEXT
1130IFF7.< >1THENPRINT ' "There is no formula in RAM with that name" : GOTO 1190: .i
SE F7.=0
1140PRINT ' "Formula: " ; AT (17.) ' ' "Name: " ; CT (17.) '
1150PRINT"Are you sure (Y or N) ?"
1160AT-GETT:PROCCHECK(AT):AT=RT:IFAT="Y"THEN1170ELSE IFAT'"N"THEN)110 ELSC :160
1170PRI NT ' " DELETED " : CT (17.) = " " : AT (17.) = " " : UT (17.) = " "
1 1 B0A7.=0: FOR 17.= 1TON7.: IFCT (17.) < >" " THENAX-AX+1: CT (A7.) -CT (17.) : AT (A7.; - AT (17.) : l ’ 1 (A7. ;
=UT (17.) : NEXT ELSE NEXT
1190N7.=A7.: F'R INT ' PT: AT—GETT: ENDPROC
1200PRINT'"Enter the formula to be DELETED";:INPUTNT:PROCCHECK(NT):NT-RT
121OFORIX= 1T0N7.: IFAT (17.) =NTTHENFX=1: ELSE NEXT
1220 IFFX< >1 THENPRINT ' "There is no such formula in RAM" : G0T01280: ELSE F7.=0
1230PRINT ' "Formula: ";AT(I7.) ' ' "Name: ";CT(I7.) '
1240PRINT"Are you sure (Y or N) ?"
1250AT=GETT: PROCCHECK (AT) :AT=RT: I FAT="Y" THEN 1260 ELSE IFAT- "N 11 THEN 1200 ELSE 125
0
1260PRI NT ' " DELETED ":CT <IX> ="":AT(IX)- " " : UT (17.) = " "
1270A7.=0: FOR 17.= 1T0N7.: I FCT (17.) < > " " THENAX=AX+1: CT (A7.) =CT (17.): AT (A7.) =AT (17.) : UT (A7.)
-UT- (17.) : NEXT ELSE NEXT
1280N7.=A7.: PRINT 'PT: AT=GETT: ENDPROC
1290REM**MENU**
1300DEFPR0CMENU
1310PR0CCLS: PRINT ' "MENU: ": IFNX-OTHENPRINT ' "The store is empty" ' ';PT:AT-GETT:END
PROC: ELSE FOR17.= 1T0N7.: PRINT ' ; 17.; " . " ; CT (17.) ; ' '; TAB (2) ; AT (17.) ; ' ' ; PT: AT-GETT: NEXT: E
NDPROC
1320REM**LEARN**
1330DEFPR0CLEARN
1340LEARN=TRUE: PROCCLS: PRINT ' "LEARN: " : IFN7.+ 1 >T7.THENPRINT ' "The Droor am has ref c .
ed ts MAX IMUM capaci ty" : PRINT 'PT: AT=GETT: ENDPROC: ELSE N7.-=N7.+ 1
1350PRINT'"Enter the name of the NEW formula"
13601NPUTCT (N7.) : PROCCHECK (CT <N7.) ) : CT (N7.) =RT: IFCT (NX.) ■ " "THEN 1360
1370FRINT'"Enter the NEW formula (Unknowns, 1 chr.)
13801 NF'UTAT < N7.) : PROCCHECK (AT (N7.) ) : AT (N7.) =RT: I FAT (N7.) = " " THEN 1380
1390p7.=0: pl7.=0: F0RI7.= 1T0LEN (AT (N7.) ) : xT=MIDT (AT (N7.) , 17., 1) : IF: T=" ) "THENp7.=p7.+ lELS
E I Fx T= " ( " THENp 17.=p 17.+1
140ONEXTIX: IFp7.< >p 17.THENPRINT ' "Please check that you have the same number o
f left and right parentheses.":GQT01380
1410PRINT'"Now, enter the single chr. unknowns (e.g. AB for A+B)";:INPUTUT(
N7.) : PROCCHECK (UT (N7.) ) : UT (N7.) =RT:
1420F0RL7.= 1T0LEN(UT <N7.) ) : M7.=ASC (MIDT (UT (N7.) ,L7., 1) ) : IFM7.<650RM7.>90THENPRINT ' "I d
o not understahd, please re-enter the unknowns as single alphabetic chr's.":G
OT01410:ELSE NEXT
1430PRINT'"Are you sure (Y or N) ?"
1440AT=GETT: PROCCHECK (AT) : AT=RT: IFAT="Y"THEN LEARN=FALSE: GOTO 1450: ELSE: IFAT-^’ N"
THEN N7.=N7.-1: GOTO 1470: ELSE: GOTO 1440
1450TEST=TRUE: F'ROCSOLVE: TEST=FALSE
1460PRINT'"STORED"
1470PRINT'PT:AT=GEfT:ENDPROC
1480REM**S0LVE**
1490DEFPR0C80LVE
1500IF TEST-TRUE THEN1660
1510PR0CCLS: PRINT ' "SOL VEi "' « IFN7.-0THENPRINT"There are no formulae in RAM to he
solved"iPRINT'PTiAT-GETT:ENDPROCIELSEiPRINT"Do you want to selert the ejuat
ion to beSOLVED by it* NAME, FORMULA or LOCATION in the menu (1; N7.; ") "
1320PRINT'"Enter 'N','F* or 'L' ?"
1530AT=GETT«PROCCHECK(AT):AT-RTtIFAT-"N"THEN1540ELSE IFAT*"F"THEN1610EL.SF If A*
f
226 PC W
MICROMART
PROGRAM FILE
5
"L"THEN 1640 ELSE 1330
1540PRINT'"What name is the desired formula stared
' 13501NPUTN*3 PROCCHECK(N*):N*=R#:IFN#=""THEN1330
1560FGRI 7.- 1 TON’/.; IFC* < 17.) -NfTHEN 15S0ELSENEX T
1370PRINT'"There is no formulae stored under the name of N*:GOTO1600
1580PRINT ' CHR* 134; At <17.) ' ' " I s this the correct formula ?"
1590A*-GET*:PROCCHECK(A#)iA*»R#sIFA*="Y"THEN1630
1600PRINT'"Do you want another search"lA*-0ET*:PROCCHECK(A*):A*=R*:IFA*-"Y"THFN
1540FLSEENDPR0C
161 OPRINT'"Enter the formula";:INPUTN*:PROCCHECK<N*>:N*-R*
1620F0R17.*» 1T0N7.: I FA* (17.) »N*THEN1650: ELSE NEXT
1630PRINT'"There is no such formula in RAM.Do you want another search <Y or N
)?":A*=GET*:PROCCHECK < A*)sA*=R*: IFA*="Y"THEN161OELSE ENDPROC
1640PRINT' "What LOCATION is the formula <1-";N7.;"> "; : 1NPUTI7.: IFI7. N7. OR I7.:1TH
EN1640ELSE 1650
1650PR0CCLS: PR I NT ' "Formula: "; A* (17.) ' ' "Name: " $ C* < 17.) '
1660PRINT"Enter the unknowns as prompted."
1670F0RK7.= 1T0 LEN(U*(I7.) ): PRINT'} MID* (U* (17.) ,K7., 1) INPUTans
16801F TEST=TRUE THEN F0RK7.= 1TOLEN (U* <N7.) > : ans = l: GOTO < 1710+ (10* ( (ASC (MID* <U* (N7.
) , K7., 1) ) ) -64) ) )
1690G0T0 (1710+ < 10* ( (ASC (MID* (U* (17.) ,K7., 1* ) )-64) ) )
1700 IF TEST-FALSE THEN NEXT: ANS-EYAL (A* (17.) ) : PRINT ' "The answer - " ; ANS ' ' P*: A*-G
ET*:ENDPROC
171 ONEXTKX: ANS-EVAL (A* (N7.) ) : ENDPROC
1720A=ans:GOTO 1700
1730B=ans:GOTO1700
1740C-ans:GOTO1700
1750D=ans:GOTO1700
1760E=ans:GOTO 1700
1770F=ans:GOTO1700
1780G=ansiJ30ICU.700
1790H=ans:GOTO1700
1800I=ans:GOTO1700
1810J=ans:GOTO1700
1820K=ans:GOTO1700
1830L=ans:GOTO1700
lB40M=ans:GOTO1700
1850N=ans:GOTO1700
18600=ans:GOTO1700
1870P=ans:GOTO1700
1880Q=ans:GOTO 1700
1B90R=ans:GOTO1700
19008-ans:GOTO1700
191OT-ans:GOTO1700
1920U=ans:GOTO1700
1930Y=ans:GOTO1700
1940W=ans:GOTO1700
1950X=ans:GOTO1700
1960Y=ans:GOTO1700
1970Z=ans:G0T01700
1980REM**INITIALIZE**
1990DEFPR0CINITIALIZE
2000P*-" "+CHR*134+"Press any key to continue"
201GLEARN-FALSE:Z *="": TEST-1: ANS =0: x*- " " : p7.-0: p 17.-0: P07.-0: N7.-0: T7.-200: DIMA* (7 7.)
C*(T7.) ,U* (T7.)
2020ENDPR0C
2u30REM**USE AGAIN?**
2040PR0CCLS:PR INT" ">
2050IF ERR-254 THENPRINT"There is no disc interface installed in this machine
please see your local Acorn dealer for details of possible installation."
:G0T02150
2060IF ERR=18 THENPRINT"You cannot divide by zero.":G0T02150
2070IF ERR—23 THENPRINT"Accuracy lost-number too extreme.":G0T02150
2075IF ERR-198 PRINT"The disk is ful1!":G0T02150
2080 IF ERR=2l*8 THENPR I NT" Load i ng Error .": GGT02150
2085IF ERR—222 PRINT"The FORMULA file is not on this disk.":G0T02150
2090IF ERR-214 THENPRINT"There is no file to DELETE.":G0T02150
2100IF ERR-U THENPRINT"Capacity is too high.":GDT02150
2110IF ERR-20 THENPRINT"The numbers were too extreme.G0T02150
2120IF ERR—26 AND TEST-TRUE THEN PRINT"That equation was i nval i d. " : N7.-N7.-1: TEST
-FALSE:G0T02150
2130IF ERR-22AND TEST—1 PRINT'"STORED (if the variables are given a certain
value, the equation will not wor k.)"''P*: A*=GET*: P^0C(JLS: GOTO 100: ELSE: IF ERR
=22 PRINT"You cannot take the log of a negative number or of zero.":G0T02150
2140IF ERR—21AND TEST—1 PRINT'"STORED (if the variables are given a certain
value, the equation will not work.)"''P*:A*=GET*:PROCCLS:G0T0100:ELSE:IF ERR
=21 THENPRINT"You Cannot 'root a negative number.":G0T02150
2150F’R I NT ' CHR* 131; " Do you want to use this facility again?" : VDU3: P07.-0: TEST-0: A
*=GET*:PROCCHECK(A*);A*=R*
2160IF LEARN-TRUE THEN N7.-N7.-1: LEARIE-FALSE
2170IFA*="Y"THEN80 ELSEEND
2180REM**L.0WER CASE CHECK fc CORRECT**
2190DEFPR0CCHECK< A1 *)
2200R*-" " : F0RH7.-1 TOLEN (A1 *) : s*=M ID* (A1 *, H7., 1) : g7.=ASC (s*)
22101Fg7.>96ANDg7.< 123THENr*=CHR* (ASC (s*) -32) ELSE r*=s*
2220R*=R*+r*:NEXT
2230ENDPR0C
2240REM**CHECK FOR PRINTER & CLS**
2250DEFPR0CCLS: IFP07.-1THEN VDU3: CLS: VDU2: ENDPROC ELSE CLS: ENDPROC
A list of 'COMMAND' words follows
1.Solve...Select equation and solve.
2. Learn... Add new formula to memory.
3. Delete..Remove a formula from RAM.
4. Menu....Print out formulae in RAM.
5. Dump.... Produce a hardcopy output.
6.Screen..Produce only monitor copy.
7.Search..Search memory for formula.
8.Load....Formulae,cass/disk to RAM.
9.Save....Formulae,RAM to cass/disk.
ENTER COMMAND NUMBER.
BBC B Astrorun
by K Sangrar
'Astrorun' is a vertically-scrolling
scramble derivative with the object of
destroying the nucleus that resides in
the ninth screen. The nine stages are
roughly arranged in three groups of
three. After each group, you earn a
bonus life and extra points are calcu¬
lated on the number of missiles you
have. There is a maximum of 20
missiles when fully stocked which are
worth 2000 points, so try to be well
stocked at these stages.
PASCAL COMPILERS
We can
advise which is the
best
Pascal for
your needs. Our wide range
includes the remarkable TURBO
Pascal.
CP/M—80
TURBO PASCAL
£45
PRO PASCAL
£200
PASCAL MT+
£210
JRT PASCAL 3
£40
JRT PASCAL 4
£65
CP/M-86
TURBO PASCAL
£45
&
PRO PASCAL
£290
MS-DOS
MS PASCAL
£220
PASCAL NTT+86
£360
SBB PERSONAL
£90
SBB PROFESSIONAL
£275
JRT "PC" PASCAL
£40
Call us for more information
GREY MATTER
1 4 Prigg Meadow, Ashburton, Devon TQ13 7DF.
TEL (0364) 53499
BC Computers
SANYO
SANYO MBC 555 BUSINESS
SYSTEMS
ACCOUNTING £ 1,500
WORD PROCESSING £ 1,750
Systems include:
BMC 555, MONITOR, PRINTER,
TWO DISK-DRIVES, PAPER,
DISKETTES, TWO DAYS’
TRAINING AND SOFTWARE
For full information on these and the rest of
the MBC 550/555 range, please ring:
DAVID BROMLEY
Reading (0734) 866372
/
DISC DATA
TRANSFER
Inter Company
Compatibility
Is your company compatible department to
department? Or do they all have their own
microprocessor systems.
Using the services of Wordcapture
intercompany compatibility is now a reality.
We can read virtually all CP/M and IBM PC
compatible formats as well as
transferring data from one to another.
Send your disc, or for further information
contact your Word Capture Point at
Sumlock, 198 Deansgate, Manchester 3.
Tel: 061-834 4233.
A division of Art Associates (M/cr) Ltd.,
Tanzaro House, Ardwick Green North,
Manchester Tel: 061-273 8751.
WORDCAPTURE
PC W 227
MICROMART
WANTED
PERSONAL
COMPUTERS
IBM, TANDY, EPSON, etc
all models bought for cash
MORGAN CAMERA
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160 Tottenham Court Road,
London W1.
Tel: 01-388 2562
BIAM CflJJETTEJ
Rely on the professionals for guaranteed top quality computer/audio
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complete with labels, inlay cards and library case.
Prices include VAT, post & packing
LENGTH
BOX PRICE (10) QTY. VALUE
5 mins (c.5)
£4.35
10 mins (c.10)
£4.40-
12 mins (c. 12)
£4.45
15 mins (c.15)
£4.50'
30 mins (c.30)
£4.70i
60 mins (c.60)
£5.30i
90 mins (c.90)
£7.00-
£
Cheque/Postal Order enclosed for
TRADE ENQUIRIES WELCOME. GET BEST TERMS, SERVICE & PRODUCT. BUY
DIRECT FROM MANUFACTURERS OF PROFESSIONAL BRAND CASSETTES.
NAME...
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Cassette House, 329 Hunslet Road, Leeds LS10 3YY
FREEPOST Tel: (0532) 706066
tEPOST Tel: (0532) 706066 A /i
AaMA/
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Create your own home, educational and business
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Bookkeeping Diaries Price lists
Budgets Diets Recipes
Catalogues Directories Sales
Customers Plans Stocks
even a children’s pictorial dictionary, are just some of
DATAL’s many and varied uses.
DATAL is a sophisticated data storage and retrieval
program. It’s easy to use, fast, flexible and very
friendly.
Programs which normally take weeks, even months,
to write can now be yours in minutes.
Price only £19.55 + 45p p&p (Europe add £1,
overseas add £2), includes DATAL User Manual with
examples to set up an Address Book and Home
Accounts.
Send cheque/PO to:
ORIGINATION
Dept W, 2-3 Forge Row, nr Soudley
Cinderford, Glos GL14 2UF
or send SAE for further details
PROGRAM FILE
A number of options are available at
thestartof each game. You may choose
the speed ofthegame; 1 is the fastest, 4
the slowest and the game defaults to
one on loading, or you may select the
difficulty; set to 1, with fewest enemies
on loading, 9 being the most difficult, or
T' may be selected for training mode.
Use the keys indicated during play. If
things go badly press ESCAPE to return
to the title page or SPACE and ESCAPE
together to return you directly to the
options.
The listing should be typed as given
without any extra spaces, since the
program isquite long. Disk owners will
have to do some relocating to use the
program from disk, or, type
'PAGE = &EOO:*TAPE <RETURN>'
before loading from tape.
In the event of a 'NO ROOM' error,
PROGRAM ONE
>L.
10REM ASTRORUN VI (c) K. Sangrar
20REM
30M0DE7:PRINT
40F0RA=145 TO150
50PR0CA <A)
60NEXT
70PRINT :, CHR»130SPC12 ,, By K. Sangrar"
80VDU28,10,24,30, 22
90CHAIN""
100
11ODEFPROCA(C)
120PRINTCHR*C;CHR*154" h7k4h7+$"“k7!j7k4h7k4j7k4j5j5juj5"
130PRINTCHR*C;CHR$154" J7k5_3k4 j5 j7o0j5j5j7o0j5j5j7o5"
140PRINTCHR*C;CHR*154" •"•!""! " "" ! ""!""! ' ' ""!"»! ,,
150ENDPR0C
PROGRAM TWO
>L.
1OREM ASTRORUN VI (c) K. Sangrar
20M0DE1:PRINTTAB(15)"STOP TAPE":VDU7
30PR0CDEFCHARS
^ 40PRGCTUNES
50A=INKEY(200):CLS
60VDU19,1,250519,2,650;
70C0L0UR1:PRINTSTRING*(40,"_")5
80C0L0UR3:PRINTTAB(15)"ASTRORUN"
90C0L0UR1:PR INTSTRING*(40,"_")5
100VDU28,0,31,39,6:C0L0UR2
11OPRINT" You are in command of a Space RaiderAssault Ship. Your mission
is to pilotyour craft as far as possible into theenemy stronghold."
120PRINT’ " Your mission is e>;tremly dangerous, so, your ship has been give
n def1ectorshields and fifteen missiles in orderto protect itself."
130PRINT'" Unfortunately, your shields will notprotect you from a direct co
11 ion exceptwith certain objects."
140F’R0Ccont i nue
150PRINT" On your mission you will meet manyhazards. These include."
160PRINT’’"ASTEROIDS"’’"These come in two sizes and are worth SOpoints if shot
. A head on collision is,of course, fatal."
170PRINT’'"SPACE MINES"’’"These are small impact mines. They areworth 150 po
ints if shot"
lBOPROCcontinue
190PRINT"Hazaras cont."
200PRINT’'"ROCKET LAUNCHERS" ’’ "These are large twin missile 1 aunchers. You rec
ieve 150 points for shooting themhowever, if you line yourself up withthem, i
nstead of crashing, you pick upits missiles and add them to your ownstock"
21OPRINT’’"GATES"’’ "These are force fields which can bebroken by flying
through the glowingpart. This gives you mystery points.Shooting the gates
gives you 100 points"
220PR0Ccontinue
230PRINT"These are your controls;"'’TAB(10)"’CAPS LOCK' - LEFT"’TAB(10)" ’CTRL
- RIGHT"’TAB(10)"'RETURN’ - FIRE"
240PRINT'’"You are given three lives for each gameunless you select ’T’ for
raining modein which you get five, but, you do notget to put your name in the
high scores."
250PRINTTAB(15,16)"START TAPE":VDU7
260VDU2B,10,30,30,28,19,3,7505 05
270ENVEL0PE1,1,0,O,0,0,0,O,127,-3,-1,-5.126,100
2B0ENVEL0PE2,1,-1,-1,-1,200,200,200.127,0,0,-4.127.127
290ENVEL0PE3,4,8,12,8,2.1,2,126,0,0,-8.126.126
300ENVEL0PE4,3,1,-2,1,1,1,2,127,0,0,0,80,80
31OCHAIN""
320
330DEFPR0CDEFCHARS
340F0RC=224T0255
350VDU23,C
360READA*
370F0RB=1TO15STEP2
380VDUEVAL("&"+MID* < A*,B,2))
390NEXT,
400! StD00=&05060307
410! &D04=?<02010102
420! &D08=«t07030605
430ENDPR0C
440
450DEFPR0CTUNES
460F0RN=S<D 10 T0&D84STEP4
press BREAK, OLD the program and
remove any extra spaces.
It's also advisable to omit line 10 in
programthreeuntilthe program is fully
debugged.
If you want to save some typing omit
lines 50 to 240 in program two and leave
out program one entirely, since prog¬
ram one is only a title page and the
instructions can be read from the
listing.
The program is reasonably well
structured, although meaningful vari¬
able and procedure names have been
omitted to save memory. There is,
therefore,still some roomfora possible
extra stage if desired.
Finally, and most importantly, my
high score is 82000 which is two and a
halftimes round all the stages. That will
give you something to aim at!
228 PCW
MICROMART
PROGRAM FILE
470READAt:!N=EVAL("&”+At)
480NEXT
490ENDPR0C
500
SlODEFPROCcontinue C0L0UR3:*FX15
520PRINTTAB<8,22)"Press 'SPACE' to continue"
530REPEATC7.= (C7.+ 1) MOD 12
540VDU 19,3, C7.7&DOO; 05
550UNTILINKEYt(5)=" "
560CLS: C0L0UR2: ENDF’ROC
570
580DATA E0713B1F1F3B71EO.004922DFFB449200
590DATA 078EDCF8F8DC8E07,92247F57577F2492
600DATA OOOOFFFFFFFFOOOO,4924FEEAEAFE2449
61ODATA 0000609009060000,1010103838101038
620DATA 387E7FFFFFFE7E18,E7BDFFFFFFFFBDE7
630DATA 0103070301010343,B0C0E0C08080C0C2
640DATA 475F7F7F7F4F0307,E2FAFEFEFEF2C0E0
650DATA 422418DB99FF99C3,0D3F7F7FFFFFFF7F
660DATA AOFOFCFEFFFFFEFE,7FFFFF7F7F3F1F05
670DATA FEFFFFFEFEFCFC70,7EC399FFFFBD9999
680DATA 99BDFFBD99181818,000A2109261B4F97
690DATA 822805AB4D7AFEC3,408410A442D8E174
700DATA 25570A269E064B13.4802800001804208
71ODATA D0A2EC714862D1A4,2F870D1142092001
720DATA C3FD2C8A22890822,E5D2904A80124020
730DATA 3500000000000000,OAOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
740
750DATA 01000001,51010C65,02510102,010C6501,51010251,04650102
760DATA 01045101,51010265,02650102,01027501,51010881,02510106
770DATA 02025101,65010C51,02510202,02026502,65020275,06510105
780DATA 01025101,65010251,06650106,01068101,75010681,06750106
790DATA 01068101,75010681,06750106,01065101,51010251,08650102
ROGRAMTHREE
L.
100NERR0RVDU4: G0T040
20PR0CI
30M0DE1:VDU23; 8202!OS 0;0;
40REPEATPR0CA
50PR0CS:REPEATPROCW
60UNTI LF.nd7,
70PR0CDS:UNTILFALSE
80DEFPR0CW
90IFEnd7. ENDPROC
1OOPROCM("SPACE BOULDERS",0,0)
11OVDU19, 1,2 5 0 S : T7.=0
120REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+1
130IFRND (D7.) >7 PRINTTAB (RND (39) -1.0) AtELSEIFRND (D7.) >7 PRINTTAB (RND (39) -1,0) at
140IFRND(100)=1PRINTTAB(RND(34)—1,0)GtELSEIFRND(100)=1PRINTTAB(RND(34)—1,0)Mt
150T7.=T7.+ 1: UNTILT7.=5000REnd7.
160IFEnd7. ENDPROC
170PR0CM("METEOR RUN”,42,24)
180T7.=0: Dt=CHRt30+CHRt11+CHRt 1 1: VDU19, 1,3 5 0;
190REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+2: I FRND (D7.) >7 PR I NTT AB (RND (39) -1,0) At
200T7.=T7.+1: UNT I LEnd7. 0RT7.=5C>0
210IFEnd7. ENDPROC
220PR0CM("EASY POINTS",42,24)
230T7.-0: VDU 19, 1,250;
240REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+1: IFRND (D7.) >8 PR INTTAB (RND (39) -1,0) At
250IFRND(20)<3 PRINTTAB <RND(35)-1,0)Gt
260T7.=T7.+1: UNTILEnd7. 0RT7.=500: I FEnd7.ENDPR0C
270PR0CB
280PR0CM<"THE CANYON",0,0)
290T7.=0: BC7.= 129: P7.= 15: G7.= 16-D7./2: I FG7.C8 G7.=8
300REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+ 1: PROCCAN: IFRND (30) =1 PRINTTAB (P7.+RND (G7.-6) ,0)Gt
3101 FRND (50) = 1 PR I NTT AB (P7.+RND (G7.-3) , 0) Mt
320T7.=T7.+ 1: UNTILEnd7. 0RT7.=500
330IFEnd7. ENDPROC
340PR0CM("THE CAVERNS",42,24)
350T7.=0: BC7.= 129: P7.= 15: R7.= 17: G7.= 13-D7./2: IFG*/.<6: G7.=6
360REPEATPROCSHIP: S7.=S7.+ 1: P7.=P7.+RND (5) -3+2* ( (P7.>39> -<P7.<3) )
370R7.=R7.+RND (5) -3+2* ( (R7.>29> - (R7.<3> ) : COLOURO
380PRI NTTAB (P7., 0> STRI NGt (G7., CHRt254) TAB (R7., 0) STRI NGt (G7., CHRt254) : T7.= T7.+1: UNT IL
End7. 0RT7.=500
390IFEnd7. ENDPROC
400PR0CM("MINED CAVERNS",42,24)
410T7.=0: BC7.= 129: P7.= 15: G7.= 19-D7./2: IFG7.< 11: G7.= l 1
420REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+ 1: PROCCAN: IFRND (D7.*2) >17 PRINTTAB (P7.+RND (G7.-1) -1,0) mt
4301FRND (30) = 1 PR INTTAB (P7.+RND (G7.-3) , 0) Mt
4401FRND (30) =1 PRINTTAB (P7.+RND (G7.-6) ,0)Gt
450T7.=T7.+1: UNTILEnd7.0RT7.=500: IFEnd7. ENDPROC
460PR0CB
470PR0CM(" THE FINAL GATES ",0,0>
480T7.=0: BC7.= 129: h7.=0: >: 7.= 15: y7.=0
490REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+1: >:7.=4*SIN (y7./PI) : h7.=h7.+ l: y7.=y7.+ l: IFh7.>31h7.=0
5001Fh7.< >OCOLOUR 128: PR I NTTAB (16,0)" " TAB (17+>:7., h7.) gt; ELSEPRI NTFGt
510T7.=T7.+ l:UNTILEnd7. 0RT7.=500: IFEnd7.ENDPR0C
520PR0CM ( "THE TRENCH" , 42,24) : T7.=0: BC7.= 129
530spt=CHRt31+CHRt17+CHRt0+STRINGt(3,st+CHRt11):Dt=CHRt30+CHRt11+CHRt11
540REPEATPR0CSHIP: S7.=S7.+2: IFT7.<450 PRINTspt ELSEPRINTTAB (19,0) st
5501F < T7.M0D6) =0 ANDT7.C 430C0L0UR1: PR I NTTAB < 14+RND (2) *3, 1) CHRt233CHRt233CHRt233
5601FT7. >490ANDT7.< 496 PRINTTAB <17, 1) Gt ELSEIFT7.=499 COLOUR 1: PR I NTTAB (18,0) STR IN
Gt(4,CHRt228)TAB(18,1)STRINGt(4,CHRt228)
570T7.=T7.+ l :UNTILEnd7. ORT7.=500: I FEnd7.ENDPR0C
580PR0CM ( " THE NUCLEUS ",42,24): T7.=0: BC7.= 128: Dt=CHRt30+CHRt 11: VDU 19, 1,4505
590REPEATPROCSH IP: S7.=S7.+1
600IFT7.=6 COLOUR 1: PRINTFGt
6101 FT7.=40C0L0UR 129: PR IN T sp t
6201FT 7.> 10 ANDT7.<60 C0L0UR3: PR INTTAB (15,0) CHRt233STF: I NGt (8. LHPt9 , CHRt2 •
630IFT7.= 42C0L0UR129: PRINTspt: C0L0UR2: PRINTTAB ( 19, 1 ) CiiRt245LHPt247r.HPt8< oRiBCHR
t10CHRt251CHRt253
640T7.=T7.+ 1: UNTILT7.=680REnd7.: IFEnd7.ENDPR0C
6501FX7.= 19 PROCM ( "CONGRATULATIONB ",69,48)
660VDU 19, 1,2,4505 : D7.=D7.+1: F'ROCB: ENDPROC
670DEFPR0CM (x t, a, b > BC7.= 128: t=>: t+" "
680S7.=S7.+250: F0RQ7.= 1T034: IFEnd7.NEXT: ENDPROC ELSEPROCSHIP: NE/ T
690Dt=CHRt0+CHRt0
700F0RQ7.=39T00-LEN>: tSTEP-2: PROCSHIP: COLOURS: IFQ7. *OPR I NTTAEl 1 — LEFT* :*• 1 '-’"
Q7.) 5
7101 FQ7.< OPR I NTTAB (0, 10) RIGHTt (x t, LENx t+Q7.)
7201FQ7.=21 -LENx t DIV2 PROCF (a, b ) : FORq= 1 TO 10: PROCSHIP: NEXT
730NEXT:Dt=CHRt30+CHRt11:CLS:ENDPROC
740DEFPR0CS PROCF(3,36)
750VDU19,3,6;0519,2,350;
7601 Ftr L7.=5 ELSEL7.=3
770D7.=9+di : X7.= 19: End7.=FALSE: S7.=-250: C7.=0: F7.=0: H7.=0: M7.= 15: F 7.=0
780S0UND0,4,5,1
790CLS:ENDPROC
DISK COPYING SERVICE
Moving data and program files from
one machine to another is often made
difficult because different
manufacturers have adopted different
disk format standards.
We can copy your files to and from
over 250 disk formats including
CP/M, CP/M-86, MS-DOS, PC-DOS, ISIS,
APPLE, SIRIUS, TORCH, APRICOT, HP 150,
DEC FT-11, and IBM REF.
Disks are normally despatched on the
day they are received.
Our charge is £10.00 + disk + VAT.
Special prices for quantities.
For more information call us.
GREY MATTER
1 4 Prigg Meadow, Ashburton, Devon TQ13 7DF. 1
TEL. (0364) 53499 |
SCIENTIFIC SUBROUTINE
LIBRARY
VOLUME 1 — STATISTICS AND FITTING FUNCTIONS
Mean, SD, normal distribution, partial expectation, Chauvenets criterion,
least squares fit to polynomial and arbitrary function, repetitive least squares
fits, covariance matrix, chi-squared statistic, matrix inversion, solution of
linear simultaneous equations.
VOLUME 2 — LINEAR PROGRAMMING
Reduction of simplex tableau, integer programming, partial integer
programming, conversational linear programming system, least cost mix
problem.
VOLUME 3 — FURTHER STATISTICS
Ranking, quantiles, frequency, correlation coefficient, T, chi-squared and F
distributions and their inverses, T test, chi-squared test, Wilcoxson test,
linear and multiple regression, ANOVA 1-way and 2-way.
VOLUME 4 — TRANSFORMATIONS AND SORTING ALGORITHMS
Fourier and Fast Fourier transforms, numerical integration and differentia¬
tion, harmonic analysis, interpolation, coordinate transformations. Ex¬
change sort, Quicksort, Shellsort, Tree sort.
All routines are written in BASIC for easy implementation on any machine.
Machine readable source code £75 + VAT per volume (Most disk formats
now available).
Manuals including full source listings with implementation notes and
documentation £25 per volume.
CP/M TO DEC FILE TRANSFER
Software to read and write RT-11 format RX01 diskettes under CP/M.
Supplied on 8" SSSD diskette — £25 + VAT.
ACT APRICOT VT100 TERMINAL EMULATOR
Allows the APRICOT to act as a terminal with file transmission and reception
£50 + VAT.
Write or phone for further information on any of our products.
MICRO LOGIC CONSULTANTS LTD
57 Station Road, Southwater, Horsham, W. Sussex RH13
7HQ
Telephone: 0403 731818
DISC DATA
TRANSFER
Compatibility with
your clients.
Consider the saving in time and human endeavour if
you could access your clients data direct from his
disc rather than re-key or plough through reams of
word processor print out.
We at Word Capture now give you that facility -
Data transfer from Disc to Disc. We can read
virtually all CP/M and IBM PC compatible formats.
Send your disc, or for further information
contact your Word Capture Point at
Sumlock, 198 Deansgate, Manchester 3.
Tel: 061-834 4233.
A division of Art Associates (M/cr) Ltd.,
Tanzaro House, Ardwick Green North,
Manchester. Tel: 061-273 8751.
'AORD CAPTURE
PC W 229
MICROMART
PROCRAM FILE
PRINTERS NEW LOW
PRICES
Large selection available.
We specialise in interfacing to
SHARP
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SPECIAL OFFER
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PRINTERS
£289
Interface for MZ700 £39
UK orders add 15% VAT
Details on our complete range from
PETERSON
ELECTRONICS LTD
ACADEMY STREET, FORFAR,
TAYSIDE, DD8 2HA
Tel: 0307 62591
sinus 1
apricot
IOSUBS
A complete set of subroutines written in BASIC
allowing the programmer to easily develop profes¬
sional user friendly software.
Subroutines allow:-
1) Alphanumeric, numeric, date, password data
to be input/output anywhere on the screen.
2) Automatic validation of input data.
3) Reverse video, Highlighted, Underlined attri¬
butes on input/output fields.
4) Full editing facilities available during data
input mode.
Price £55 with demo software. inc VAT
Available on ACT Sirius 1 and Apricot
AIR-RAID
A fast action graphics game
Price £11.50 inc VAT
Available on ACT Sirius 1 and Apricot
For further details please contact:
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37-39 Southgate St, Winchester
Hants S023 9EH. Tel. Winchester (0962) 60738
COMMODORE 64 OWNERS
YES!! You can now make
back-up copies of your pre¬
cious original. The Copy Gener¬
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makes copies of your games
etc, from tape to tape or tape to
disk.
For your copy of the amazing
program send cheque or PO for
£6.50 to:
Ramex Technological Research
PO Box No. 3
Castleford, W. Yorks
WE101UX
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800DEFPR0CSHIP IFF7.PRINTTAB (H7., F7.) " "
810PRINTTAB ( X7., 26) s*: COLOURBC7.: PRINTD*: X7.=X7.+ ( INKEY-65AND ( X7.>1 ) ) - ( INKEY-2AND ( X
7.< 38) > : VDU 19,2, C7&D00; O; : PR I NTTAB ( X7.. 26) S*: C= <C+1) MOD 12: IFI NKEY-740RF7.PROCF I RE: I
FF7.PR I NTT AB (H7., F7.) R*
82GREPEATUNTILTI ME >s7.: TI ME=0: MOVE X7. #3 2+16,208: C7.=PO I NT ( X7.*32+16.208) +F'01 NT < X.7.*
32+48,208) : IFC7.=0 ENDPROC
830IFC7.=4 S7.=S7.+100*RND (3) : SOUND 18, 1,223, 1 : ENDPROC
8401FC7.=6 M7.=M7.+4: SOUND 17,3,20,3:1 FM7. >20M7.=20
850IFC7.=6 ENDPROC
B60PR0Cex: ENDPROC
870DEFPR0CFI RE I FF7.THEN890
880IFM7.=0ENDF'R0C ELSEF7.=24: H7.= X7.+k7.: M7.=M7.-1: S0UND19,2, 100, 10: k7.= k7.EORl: ENDPROC
890F7.=F7.-1: C7.=P01 NT (H7.*32+16,1 OOS-32*F7.) +P01 NT (H7.*32+16,1040-32*F7.) : I FC7.C >0 PR
INTTAB (H7.-1, F7.-1) E*:S0UND16, 1,4,4: SOUNDO, 4,5,2: S7.=S7.+50*C7.: PR I NTT AB (H7.-1, F7.-2) e*
: F7.=FALSE
900IFF7.=2 PR INTTAB (H7., F7.) " " : F7.=FALSE
910ENDPR0C
920DEFPR0CI di = l
930A*=CHR*17+CHR*1+CHR*239+CHR*240+CHR*8+CHR*3+CHR*10+CHR*241+CHR*242
940M*=CHR*17+CHR*3+CHR*243+CHR*243+CHR*8+CHR*8+CHR*10+CHR*244+CHR*244
950S*=CHR* 17+CHR*3+CHR417+CHR* 12B+CHR*234+CHR*235+CHR*3+CHR* 8+CHR* 1O+CHR*236+C
HR*237
960s*=" 11 +CHF:*8+CHR*8+CHR* 10+ "
970G*=CHR*17+CHR*3+CHR4224+CHR*17+CHR*2+CHR*225+< HR*225+CHR*225+CHR*225+CHR*17
+CHR*3+CHR*226
980q*=CHR* 17+CHR* 1 +CHR*228+CHR*228+CHR* 17+CHR*2+CHR*230+CHR*230+CHR*230+CHR* 17
+CHR*1+CHR*228+CHR*22B
990FG*=CHR*31+CHR*13+CHR*0+CHR*17+CHR*1+CHR*227+STRING*(13,CHR*228)+CHR4229
1000a*=CHR* 17+CHR* 1 +CHR*232: m*=CHR* 17+CHR*3+CHR*238: F:*=CHR* 17+CHR*2+CHR*23:
1010e*=" "+STRING*(3,CHR*8+CHR*8+CHR*B+CHR*10+" "):D*=CHR*30+CHR*11
1020tr=FALSE: s7.= l: X*=STRING*(3,CHR*8) +CHR*10
103OE*=CHR*17+CHR*2+CHR*245+CHR*246+CHR*247+X*+CHR*248+CHR*249+CHR*250+X*+CHR*2
51+CHR*252+CHR*253
1040DIMHS7.<9> , Names 200
1050FORP=0 TO 9:HS7.(P)=1000:*(Names+P*20)="BBC Computer":NEXT
1060C=0: 1 &DF0-&20120DD0: ?8<DF4=?<80: ENDPROC
1070DEFPR0CHI pl=10:*FX15
10801 Ftr S7.=0
1090S0UND16,0,4,20:VDU19,1,4 j 0?
1100F0RP=9T00STEP— 1: IFHS7. (P) < =S7. p 1 =P
111ONE XT:IFp1>9 GOTO1170
1120F0RP=9 TO pl+1 STEP-1
1130HS7. (P)=HS7. <F'-1) : $ <Names+20*P) =* (Names-20+20*P>
1140NEXT:COLOURS
1150PRINTTAB(8,4)"YOU ARE IN THE TOP TEN !" ’’TAB(9)"PLEASE TYPE YOUR NAME
COLOUR129:PRINTTAB(10,9)SPC20TAB(11,9);
1160*(Names+20*pl > =FNINPUT: HS7. (pi ) =S7.
1170ENDPR0C
1 180DEFPR0Csc COLOUR 128: CLS: @7.= 7: VDU 19, 1,2; 05
1190C0L0UR3:PRINTSPC6STRING*(28,"_")’’SPC11"ASTRORUN HISCORES"’SPC6STRING$(28,
” _ ")
1200C0L0UR2: PR I NTT AB (0, 6) 1; " . "5 HS7. (0) STRI NG* < 25-LEN (STR*HS7. (0) +*Names) , " . " ) *Na
mes
121OCOLOUR1:FORP=1T09
1220PRI NTT AB (0, 6+P*2) P+1; " . " ; HS7. < P) STR I NG* (25-LEN (STR*HS7. (P) +* (Names+20*P) ) , " .
11 ) * (Names+20*P)
1230NEX T:PROCwait(1000):ENDPROC
1240DEFPR0CdiFt CLS
1250PRINTTAB(11,10)"WHAT DIFFICULTY ?"TAB(4,12)"(1 TO 9 OR ’T’ FOR TRAINING MOD
E) " : REPEATK*=GET*: UNTIL <K*>"0" ANDK*< " : ")ORK*= ,, T"
1260IFK*=”T ,, di=0:tr=TRUE: ENDPROC
1270di=VALK*:tr=FALSE:ENDPROC
1280DEFPR0Cspeed CLS
1290PRINTTAB(11,15)"WHAT SPEED LEVEL ?"TAB(16,17)"(1 TO 4)":REPEATK*=GET*•UNTIL
K*>"0" ANDK*<"5"
1300s7.=4+VALK*: ENDPROC
131 ODEFPROCe>: SOUND 16,1,6,5
1320L7.=L7.-1: M7.= 15: h7.=0: VDU 19, 2, 3 5 0;
1330PRI NTT AB ( X7.-1,25) E*
1340FORN=1T02000: NEXT: IFL7.=0 End7.=TRUE: ENDPROC
1350CLS: F7.=FALSE
1360X7.= 19: FORx 7.=X7. T0X7.- (3*L7.-3) STEP-3
1370PRI NTT AB (>: 7., 26) S*: NEX T
1380PRI NTT AB (13, 30) "Score " ; S7.
1390F0RN=1T02000:NEX T:CLS
1400S0UND0,4,5,255:ENDPROC
141ODEFPROCDS CLS:VDU19,3,6;0;
1420IFS7.>HS7. (9) PROCHI: PROCsc: ENDPROC
1430C0L0UR3: PRINTTAB (12,3) "YOU SCORED " 5 S7.
1440PR0Cwait(1000):ENDPROC
1450DEFPR0CCAN C0L0UR128: C0L0UR1: c7.=RND (5) -3: P7.=P7.+c7.: IFP7.<'2 P7=2ELSEIFP7 >26 P7
=26
1460IFc7=0 PRINTTAB (P7., 0) STRING* (G7., " " ) ELSEIFc%>0 PRINTTAB (P7.-1 , O) CHR*242STRI
NG* (G7.-1, " " ) CHR*239 ELSEPRINTTAB (P7., 0) CHR*240STRING* (G7.-1, " ")CHR*^4i
1470ENDPR0C
1480DEFPR0C0PT
1490st=FALSE:TIME=0
1500REPEATCLS
1510VDU19,2.350;19,1,6(0;
1520C0L0UR1:PRINT’ 7 'TAB(10)"Press key For option"’ J
1530C0L0UR2: @7.=8
1540PRINT’1;" To change diFFiculty"
1550PRINT’2;" To change speed"
1560PRINT’3;" To view ship controls"
157OPRINT’4;" To view point allocations"
1580PRINT’’TAB(8)"Or ’SPACE’ to start game"
1590K*=T NKEY*(2000)
16001 FK*= " 1 " PROCd i -f f
16101FK*="2"PROCspeed
1620IFK*="3"PROCcont
16301FK*="4"PR0Cpoints
1640UNTILK*=" "ORTIME >2000
1650IFK*-" "st=TRUE
1660ENDPR0C
1670DEFPR0Ccont CLS:C0L0UR3
1680PRINTTAB(10,8)"Your controls are:"
1690PRINT”TAB(9) "’CAPS LOCK’ - LEFT"
1700PRINT’TAB(9)"’CTRL’ - RIGHT"
1710PRINT’TAB(9>"’RETURN’ - FIRE"
1720PRQCwait(2000)
1730ENDPR0C
1740DEFPR0Cpoints CLS:COLOURS
1750VDU19,1,250;19,3,650?
1760PRINT'"POINTS FOR HITTING OBJECTS WITH MISSILES"
1770PRINT’’TAB(8)"Asteroid - 50 points"
1780PRINT’’TAB(8)"Missi1e launcher - 150 points"
1790PRINT’’TAB(8)"Space mine - 150 points"
1800PRINT’’TAB(8)"Canyon wall - 50 points"
1810PRINT’’TAB(8)"Bonus of 100 to 300 points for"SPC10"passing through a qate"
1820PRINT’TAB(8)"Extra missiles for passing"SPC14"through a missile launcher"
1830PR INTTAB (3,4) A*TAB (3,7) M*TAB (3, 10)m*TAB(l. 17) G*TAB (3,20). M*: COLOUR 129: PR I NTT
AB(3,13)s*:COLOUR128
1840PR0Cwait(2000):ENDPROC
1850DEFPR0Cwait(T)C0L0UR2:C=0:TIME=0
1860PRINTTAB(7,30)"Press ’SPACE’ to continue":*FX15
230 PC W
MICROMART
PROGRAM FILE
1870REPEATC=(C+1 >MOD12:VDU19,2,C7&D00;0;
1880W*=INKE Y$(10):UNTILTIME>T ORW*=" ":IFW*=" " sp=TRUE
1890C0L0UR3:ENDPROC
1900DEFPR0CA
191C>sp=FALSE: IFINKEY-99THEN1960
1920REPEAT
1930PR0CTITLE
1940PR0Csc
1950UNTILsp
1960PR0C0PT
197C>IFst ENDPROC
1980G0T01910
1990DEFPR0CTITLE COLOUR128:CLS:VDU5
2000VDU19,1,450?19,2,050?19,3,3;0;
2010PR0CL <218, 732,51, -4) : PROCL (218.732, 51,0) : PROCH(24.620. 200)
202OPR0CL(352,680,8,-8):PROCL(288,648,8,8):PROCL(352,616,8,-8)
2030PR0CL(444.700,29,0):PROCH(424,680,100)
2040PR0CL(552,680,24,0):PROCL(648,680,12,-8)
2050PR0CL(726,680,12,-4):PROCL(678,632,12.4):PROCL(726,680,12.4):PROCL(772,632,
12,-4)
2060PR0CL(824,680,24,0):PROCL(920,680,12,-8)
2070PR0CL(972,680,24,0):PROCL(1060,680,24,0):PROCH(980,584,108)
2080PR0CL (1120. 680,24,0).: PROCL (1216,680,12,-8): PROCL (1216,680.38,0): PROCH (226.5
28,1016)
2090GC0L0, 1: M0VE424,400: F’R I NT " By K. Sangrar"
21OOBCOLO,2:M0VE416,404:PRINT"By K. Sangrar"
2110VDU4: PROCwai t (1000) : VDU19, 1,2; O; 19, 2,7; 0; 19, 3,6; 0;
2120ENDPR0C
2130DEFPR0CL (x 7., y7., n7., a7.)
2140IFINKEY-99 ENDPROC
2150F0RN7.=0T0n7.
2160GC0L0, 3: MOVEx 7., y 7.: PR INTCHR*254
2170GC0L0, 1: MOVEx7., y7.: PR I NTCHR$255
2180x7.=x7.+a7.: y7.=y7.-4: NEXT
2190ENDPR0C
2200DEFPR0CH <x7., y%, n7.)
221OIFINKEY-99 ENDPROC
2220GC0L0,3
2230F0RN7.=0T0n7.STEP2
2240PL0T69, x 7.+N7., y7.
2250NEXT:ENDPROC
2260DEFFNINPUT A7.=0: X7.-&F0: Y7.=>&D: OALL&FFF 1: =»2<DD0
2270DEFPR0CB L7.=L7.+ 1: S7.»S7.+2000+100*M7.
2280M7.-20: PROCM ( ” BONUS LIFE ", 21, 18 > : ENDPROC
2290DEFPR0CF(a,b)FORc=a TOa+b STEP3
2300S0UNDc?&D 10, 1, c?&Dl 1, c?&D12
2310NEXT:ENDPROC
Commodore Honeypot
by Chris Haley
'Honeypot'is an enjoyable gameforthe
Commodore 64 in which you must
manoeuvre a bee around flowers to
collect nectar for the hive.
Nectar is collected by hovering over
one of the flowers which occasionally
bloom and must be carried back to the
hive. When you fill up the hive you
move on to the next level.
However, life isn't all sweetness and
honey for a bee as there's a large bird
and an evil spider out to get you. Also,
touching any other part of the plants is
fatal as is contact with weeds; and, of
course, flying into the sun is not
recommended.
It's important that you visit each
10 REM---HONEYPOT-
•
20 REM "
30 REM -ICI C.S. HALEY 1984
40 REM ■ w
•
•
30 REH COMMODORE SPECIAL SYMBOLS
60 REH -r CURSOR DOWN
70 REH "T CURSOR UP
•
•
00 REH -IT CURSOR RIGHT
90 REH -r CURSOR LEFT
100 REH -r HOHE (CURSOR)
•
•
110 REH »T CLEAR SCREEN
120 REM -r REVERSE CHARACTERS ON
130 REH m W REVER8E CHARACTERS OFF
•
•
140 REH BLACK
150 REM RED
168 REH "k" CYAN
•
•
A
170 REH "ir GREEN
190 REM "flT YELLOW
190 REM BECAUSE MV PRINTER DOES NOT
•
200 REM LIST THE CHARACTERS WHICH
210 REM REPRESENT THE COLOURS OBTAINED
•
•
220 REM USING THE COMMODORE L000 KEY T
230 REM HAVE REPLACED THESE WHERE THEV
240 REM OCCUR IN THIS LISTING BY
•
•
250 REM ABBREVIATIONS FOR THE ACTUAL
260 REM C0L0l.fR SHOWN IN SQUARE BRACKETS
270 REM FOR EXAMPLE CLT.0RN1.
•
•
280 REM "II" DELETE - THIS ONLY OCCURS
290 REM LINE 1510 AND 18 USED TO MOVE
300 REM THE SUN TO THE LEFT. TO OBTAIN
•
•
310 REM THIS/ KEY IN THE LINE OMITTING
•
flower as it blooms, even though the
ones furthest from the hive have the
most nectar, as this will pollinate them
and increase the chances of more
flowers appearing when the existing
ones disappear.
Read the REM statements at the
beginning of the program as they
contain vital coding instructions relat¬
ing to Commodore's control charac¬
ters. Consequently, there is no need to
type these lines at all, so you should
begin typing at line 900.
Make sure that you have a working
joystick as this is the only way to control
your bee.
PROLOG INTERPRETERS
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IF/Prolog
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micro-PROLOG
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PROLOG-1
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CP/M-86 £600 + VAT
MS-DOS £600 + VAT
CP/M-80 £125 + VAT
CP/M-86 £175 + VAT
MS-DOS £175 + VAT
CP/M-80 £250 + VAT
CP/M-86 £330 + VAT
MS-DOS £330 + VAT
For more information call us.
GREY MATTER
4 Prigg Meadow, Ashburton, Devon TQ13 7DF.
TEL (0364) 53499
Spectrum 16K
Spectrum 48K
Commodore 64
Electron
COMPUTERS
£86.90 BBC B £346.95
£113.00 Tatung Einstein £433.90
£161.00 Sanyo MBC555 £999.00
£173.80 Apple Computers available
PRINTERS
Alpha Com 32
(for Spectrum)
Epson RX80 F/T
Epson FX80
Star Gemini 10X
£52.20 Epson RX80
£235.00 Printer Cable
£330.00
MONITORS 14" COLOUR
£205.00
£215.00
£8.50
Microvitic £173. TV Monitor £200
both complete with lead Nomendy/ Saba
CUMANA DISK DRIVES
SPECIAL PRICE 100K single without power supply £127
with power supply £145 200K double £260
Phone for price on other drives
ACCESSORIES
BBC Disk interface
£92.00
Upgrade A to B
£79.00
Spectrum 16K to 48K
JOYSTICKS Quickshot 1
£22.00
£6.50
Quickshot 2
£7.50
Sidewise Rom Board ATFL
£38.00
*27128 EPROMS
£17.00
*2764 EPROMS
£6.00
Large selection of software. Too many to list
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20% off all other s/w (for cash)
Add 80 pence Post & Packing for small items and £6 for large items
ADD 15% VAT TO TOTAL
Leigh Computer Systems
pW'.dn.m Viv»|
36 Derby Road, Hinckley
Leicestershire LE10 1QF
Tel: (0455) 612139
*Discounts on volume
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HIRE SPECTRUM
SOFTWARE
OVER 280 different tapes for hire in¬
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I enclose cheque/postal order for £3.00 for LIFE membership. Please rush
my membership kit to me. If, within 28 days, I’m not delighted with your
service you’ll refund my membership fee..
Name__i_
PC W 231
MICROMART
SCREEN-SCENE
SERVICE SINCLAIR
To manufacturers specifications
Computer Repair Charges
Sinclair Spectrum £20
Sinclair ZX81 £14
Sinclair ZX Printer £19
(All including VAT and return carriage)
Quick turn-round + 3 months warranty
STOCKISTS OF
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GP 50 complete with Spectrum interface
£99.95
GP 500A Centronics interface £179.95
GP 700 Colour printer, Centronics interface
£349.95
(All excluding VAT and carriage)
144 St. George’s Road, Cheltenham,
Gloucs GL50 3EL. Tel: (0242) 528979
(We accept Amex, Access, Visa and Diners Club)
COURSEWINNER
The Punters Computer Program
COURSEWINNER allows you to use the power of your
computer to get the edge on the bookmaker
• COURSEWINNER v.mtains a database- full of detailed
information on all English and Scottish flat courses.
The ten leading jockeys and trainers, and effect of the
draw is detailed for each course.
This information can be displayed on the screen at any time
• The program analyses these factors combined with the results
of the last three outings, starting price and weight carried.
• COURSEWINNER is simple and quick to use, yet very powerful.
• Boxed with detailed instruction booklet.
Price £12.50 all inclusive immediate dispatch return of post
Available for:
SPECTRUM 1 48K i, BBC B), COMMODORE64, DRAGON, APPLE II/IIe. ATARI 48K .
POOLSWINNER
The Ultimate Pools Prediction Program
• POOLSWINNER is the most sophisticated pools prediction
aid ever produced. It comes complete with its own massive
database.
• Can be used for Scoredraws, Draws, A ways and Homes.
• The database contains over 20000 matches (10 years league
football). It updates automatically as results come in.
• The precise prediction formula can be set by the user. This n
allows development of your own unique method. N
• Package is complete with program, database and detailed
instruction booklet.
Price £15.00 all inclusive immediate dispatch return of post
Available for: SPECTRUM (48K , ZX81 I6K). BBC <B I, COMMODORE 64. DRAGON.
APPLE II/IIe, ATARI (48K ).
Available from dealers or direct (return of post i from:
selec
SOFTWARE ' V/ °Y
37 Councillor Lane, Cheadle, Cheshire. Phone: 061-428 7425
FLOPPY DISC SYSTEM FOR
SPECTRUM
Our new model — BETA DISK is
even better than ever.
Some of the main features:
★ Disc Operating System in EPROM
★ Uses ONLY 128 bytes of Spectrum Memory
★ Locates below BASIC programs
★ Uses Spectrum Keywords
★ Supports up to FOUR disc drives
★ Compatible with 40, 80, single or double
sided drives
★ Up to 1.6 Mbytes of memory
★ Random access is provided
★ BASIC programs can be merged
★ Duplicated Spectrum connector is provided
★ Password protected
13 :
£85 excluding VAT
£2 p&p
> Technology Research Limited
Unit 18 Central Trading Estate, Staines,
Middlesex
Tel: Staines (0784) 63547
PROGRAM FILE
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320 REM THE DELETES THEN CURSOR B8CK TO
330 REM THE QPPROPRIPTE POSITION TN THE
340 REM LIME.- 0PEW P OPP WITH THE
350 REM THE INSERT KEV PND THEN PRE8S
360 REM THE DELETE KEV.
370 REM PLL OTHER SPECIPL SYMBOLS PRE
300 REM 0RPPHICS USED TO MPKE THE SCENE
390 REM THE PPRTS 0E THE SCENE PRE : ~
400 REM LINES “7020-57070 THE WEEDS
410 REM 57075-57140 THE FLOWER PLPNTS
420 REM 57150-571P0 THE H0NEV STORE
430 REM 58020 THE SUN
440 REM 50030 THE CLOUD
450 REM 5004P-50060 THE HIVE
460 REM 50095 THE 0RPSS
510 REM DO HOT TVPE IN THE RE"S<
520 REMR^RRRRRRRWRRW****************
900 OOSUB40000:REM 00 T 0 INITIRLI8«TI0N
99 9 REM STPRT OF MPIN 0PME LOOPS
990 S8»PEEK(S(30)):SB*PEEK(S(3f)) FORL-PTO^
1000 F0RP-3T07:FORJ*0TODE : FORI-0TO t
1009 REM DETECT FIRE BUTTON PND BEE DIRECTION
1010 FF-PEEK(49191)
1020 BD-PEEK(491P9)
1060 SO-0
1070 I FFFPNDBS>0THENBS«BS-1 : SO* 1 : P0KEN (18 ). 0: P0KEN(18 ), 129 : PR I NT" »*> ": pc
1079 REM DETECT BEE COLLISIONS
1080 SS-PEEK (S ( 30)): SB-PEEK <S (31. > >
1090 IFSSRND1THENOOTO2000
11001FSBPND1THENOOTO30P0
1109 REM MOVE SPIDER
1110 SD*PEEK(S(0))-PEEK(S(2))
1120 X2-X2+S0N ( SD)*YJ : POKES < 2),X2RND255
1130 IFPBS ( SD) <20RNDV2>SHTHENV2-V2-V.T: 0C T 01.1.50
11401FV2<235THENV2*V2+YJ
1150 POKE(SO)), V2
1170 POKER1,B(BD,I) : P0KER2,SP( I)
1174 REM MOVE BIRD
1175 X3*X3+XI:IF<X3>350>THENX3«0
1180 IF<X3PND256)THENP0KES(16),PEEK(S<16)>0R4:POKES(4),X3PND255:00T01195
1190 POKES(16),PEEK(S(16))PND251 : POKES(4),X3PND255
1195 S5«PEEK (S(5))+1NT(5.5-10#RND (0)) ; I P S5< 185PNDS5> 11 ,; tmfnP0KES (5), S5
1200 BN-BN-ND : IEBN<0THEN5000
1210 POKES(37),BC(BNX25):P0KEN(0),250-BNP2
1300 NEXT:NEXT
1399 REM CROW PLPNTS
1400 S0*PEEK(S(21))
1405 IFPL(P)THEN1430
1410 IFRND(0)#10#(8-P»FFXTHEN1445
1420 PL(P)-1:FFK-FFX-8+P
1430 FX* 1 -FX : PRINTBLt: PPf (P); PHf (P!_(p), FX): SC*SC0RPS(PL(P))
1435 PL(P)-PL(P)+1
1440 IFPL(P)>8THENS0*S0PND(N0T2 tP):POKES(39+P V,4:1ept rp>.10THENPL('°)=0
1445 S0-S00R(PS( p L(P)))tP : POKES(21),SO
1490 NEXT
1499 REM DISPLPV SCORES
1500 P0X*P0X+HN+BS+BN+FFX : PRINT"W«»*MM»»MMmir : P 0 ‘/.:
1510 PR I NT" pMHfeidXllf';
1520 PRINT-'WWKMI 1911 Wl
1530 IFFN<0THEN5000
1550 NEXT
1554 REM NI0HTFPLL
1555 POKE53280,0 : P0KE53281,0
1560 0OTO5060
1999 REM FEE COLLISIONS WITH OTHER SPRITES
2000 IFSS0ND6THEH2030
2010 F0RF*3TO7:IFS$flNDFP(F)fHENPOKES(F+39>, 10:FP5'«FP5 '+i : TCDW<i0flTHFNBN*pw+9-F
2020 NEXT:00T01100
2030 IF(SS0N52>PNB(0BS(PEEK(S(i.))-'PEEK<S(3))»15)THENH00
2050 IFSGTHENP0KE8(1), PEEK(S(1))-20 : P0KEN <18),0:P0KEN(18 >,33:GOT01100
2060 GOTO 5000:REM GOTO DEPTH SCENE
2999 REM BEE COLLISIONS WITH DPTP
3000 BX-PEEK (S (0)): BU-PEEK (S (16)) PND 1: BV-PEEK (S(1.))
3018 IFBV>65PNDBV<130THENni0
3020 IFBU-0THENIFRND(0)CCDTHEN5000
3030 IFBN>35THENBN«BN-10:HN-HN+ 1 0:OOTn3045
3040 IFHN>0THENBN*BN+10:HN-HN-10
3045 IFHN>500THEN6000
3950 P0INTBLt;H«;HSf(HN/25); =00101110
4999 REM DEPTH OF BEE
9000 SVS49213 : PQKES(3), 235 ; POKER1 , 248 : P0KEN<4) > 0
5810 BV«PEEK(S(l)) ; DR-(235-BV)/246:P0KEN(n),17
5020 FOR I W*255T010STEP-2 ' FOR JVI»0TO1
5030 BV-BV+D*?P0KE9< 1) a BV: POKEH(8), IW-JVI: P0KER2, SP( JW)
5040 NEXT:NEXT:POKEN(11),0:BB*BB-1
5058 IFBB>0THEMBM-25:BS-n*LV:OOSUB50500:09-P^EK(S(30)):SB»PEEK(S(31)) ; OOTO1010
5060 POKES(32),7:POKES(33)..0:POKE8(21),0
5070 rriirr imwwTirw *mo vou mrr pnother ormett
5000 OETPt:IFRf*""THEH5000
5090 IFPt«"V"THENOOSUB57500:OOTO990
5100 SVS10
5999 REM INCREMENT DIFFICULTY LEVEL
6010 F!*0:POKEN(4),0 : POKEN<11)>0 : POKEN<4)/33 : POKEN(11),33
6020 FORIM*0TO1 : FORJU-0TO253STEP2: Fl-Fl+1: P0KEN( 1 >, JW: PQKEN(8), FI: NEXT: NEXT
€025 POKENai)/0 ! POKEN<4),0
6030 POKEN(0),200:POKEN<n,l
6050 DF-DF-1:IFDF<0THENDF-0
6060 BS-ll-LV:IFBSCfTHENBS-e
6070 VJ«VJ-*-i:XI«XI+l
6080 HN“100 : BN»25 : FFJJ*10: SH*9H-2
6090 NIH_V/5:CD«CB*0.!
6100 OOSUB58000
232 PC W
PROGRAM FILE 1
6110 OOTO990
39999 REM DISPLAY INSTRUCTIONS
40000 POKE53280,7:POKE53201,0
40010 PtlNTVJI SHONEYPOTT SPRINT
40020 PRINT" THE OBJECT OF THE OPHE IS TO FILL THE
40030 PRINT"HONEYCOMB IN T*€ HIVE WITH HONEY, USING
40039 REM INITIALISE VPRIPBLE8
40040 PRIHT"THE BEE TO COLLECT NECTPR FROM THE -
40030 PRINT-PLANTS PS THEY FLOWER. THIS PLSC"
40060 PRTNT"FERTILIZES THE PLPNT PND INCREPSES THE”
40070 PRINT-CHRNCE OF RNOTHER PLPNT GROWING. THE"
40080 PRINT"FLOWERS FURTHEST FROM THE HIVE HRVE THE"
40090 PRINT-MOST NECTPR. THE BEE DARKENS PND ITS"
40100 PRINT-BUZZ DEEPENS «S IT FILLS WITH NECTPR."
40110 PRINT" the BEE WILL DIE IF IT RUNS OUT OF"
40120 PR!NT"NEC T PR OR IF NIOHT FRLLS BEFORE THE"
40130 PRINT-HIVE IS FULL. PVOID FLYING INTO PPRTS"
40140 PRINT"OF PLANTS OTHER THAN the FLOWERS PND"
40130 PRINT"D0 NOT FLY INTO THE SUN."
49160 PRINT" THE SPIDER PND BIRD WILL CPTCH the"
40170 print"BEE IF THEY CPN BUT THE BEE CRN ESCPPE"
40180 PRINT-BV USING ONE OF ITS FEU STING8."
40190 PRINT"* CONTROL THE BEE WITH 0 JOYSTICK IN"
40200 PRINT"PORT 2, FIRE CONTROLS THE STINO."
49999 REM REPB M/C PND SPRITE DPTP
50000 C-0 = FORK-49200TO49384
50005 REPDP : C S C+P ; POKEK,P:NEXT
50008 RFPDT- IFTOCTHENPRINT"ERR0R IN MACHINE CODE DPTP - T0TRL -";C:$TQP
50010 POKE49190;1:P0KE49192,23:P0KE49193,63 : P0KE49194,63:P0KE*9193,220
50015 C-0:FORK-240TO248:I*K#64:FORJ-0T063
50020 REPDP:C-C+P : POKEI + J, P:NEXT:NEXT
50030 REflB?:IFTOCTHENPRINT"ERROR IN SPRITE DPTP - TOTAL -";C : ST0P
30040 DIM S(47),B(1,1),N(29),PH*<9,1),H8*<20)
50045 FORI-0TO46:SCI)-532404I:NEXT
50050 R1*2040 : R2*2041
50060 B(0,0)-240:B<0,1)-241:B<1,0)-242:B<1,!>-243
50070 SP(0)*244:$P(1)-245
50080 FORI»0TO7:FP<I)-2tl:NEX T
50090 FORIs0TO20:M<I>-54272+I : NEXT
50100 BC<0)®1 : BC<1)=7 ■ BC<2)-8 : BC<3>-10 : BC<4)*2
56000 POKEN<0>,200:POKENa),l:POKEN<2),0 p OKEH<?),7 orycvyc.',
56010 P0KEN( 19), 9 : POKEN(20), 0 : °9KEN( 1.4), «70:°0KEN( IS'* • 2*
56020 P0KEN(12), 15 : P0KEN(13), 255
56050 P0KES(6),31:P0KES(T),193
56060 POKES (8)•79 : POKE?< 9)■195
56078 POKESa0),12S:*»OKFS<in,19«
56080 POKES<12),175:POKES(13),!95
56090 POKES <14),223:POKES(15),195
56100 POKES(27),1
56110 PnKES<39),0:PnKES(40),0- D OXES(4i V?
56120 POKES(29).4:POKES(30),0 _ „-,■***-
56125 p CKER 1,240 :P0KER2,244:POKE2042 246 -
37010 PPt(3)»"W" WPf(0)-"IM**l" „ t ^ r
37020 FORI-lT04PP*(3+I)-PP*(2+I)+"l*m»r:l*P*(I'=WP*<!-!)- t,, * , ’»B* r
37030 iJH*(0)-"inu muoni nn• "***-*-?*?"
37040 WHf (1) - " II! ' Tl' TP
37030 WHf(2)-WHt(I)+"ll»4RTll+"
37060 WH4 ( 3) -WHt (0 )+"
57070 WHt(0)-WN«(0)+" +" : WH*(1 )-WH*( 1 >+" +" : *>***<i >
37073 PHt(0,0)«" w : p Hf(0, i)■""
37080 PHf(!,0)*-CLT.ORN. DII":PHt(l,l>-PHfa,0)
37090 PHf(2,0)*"tLT.ORN, 1*1 HW" :PH*<2, l>*"a T .9PN.
37100 DHf(9,0)*"CL T .0RY. ]trrv+;ffftr PH»(3,l>«"ILT.ORN.3TllWr __
37110 PH*(4,0)«"CLT.nRN. iTnilWS**' :RHf(4, l>--rL T .0RY. iUTT* xmmtr
37120 PHf(3,0)*"" :PHf(3,l)*"" : PHt<6,0)*"- P uf ^ < I >s ""' Pufr7,9 '®
37130 PH*<A,0)«"Tr7TM!IWiir ■ p uf(8,l)*PHf(8,0>
37140 pu$( 9,0)-"II HR Hill TiW - pm*(9-!)=PM*(9*>
57160 HS*(0)****”* l)-"!IU":HSt<2)*"!V"
57170 FORI-5TO17STEP4:F0RII*ITni+3
57180 HSf(II)-"HW rTr+HStai^VNEXTtMEXT
57500 FFX*10:BB-3:POX-0
57510 DF-4:CD-0.2 : ND-0.2:LV *\
57320 PS* 10: HN*1.00: BN-23
57530 YJ—4:SH—188
57540 FORI-0TO9: PS( I )-0: NEX* r : PS(5>=2 1 PS<6>-2: PS(7>s2
57550 XI* 1.0
37R0O PRINT" jr0RP w 0E 1 PRESS RWV KEY TO CONTINUE*"
57810 OETRf: I FR$* "" THEN57R1'«
57999 REM SET UP SCREEN
58000 FORI-3TO7:PLa)«TNT<RNTK0>P19)-10:TPPL<IK8 T HEH p La>-P
58010 NEXT:FORII*42T046: p 0KES(II),4 :HEX 1 "
58013 P0KES(32),6 : P0KES(33),6 -fc-njr ymtm *!•*** ***
58030 pr i nt " mtm ic lt . grey i mmmr m*m*wv*r*j —’
58050 PRINT"CBROWN3 !* II 9 nimmirORflNOEl « * 9 •RRS»*? f '
58055 PRINT"! BROWN 3 1* •! ■ HlI»*RI*rnRRNnE1 W HIW"
58060 PR!NT"*CBROWN] »! r^l»*i!5 r ORPNOE 1 * ■'•■PH_"
38065 PR!N T BL4 > Ht;NS4(HN/25)
58070 FORIW-0TO4:PRlNTBLf; WP*(IW)WHt(TW> :BL^ :pp «< T W-3>;
58080 FORJW-0TOPL(T W+3 > : PRINT: pw «< TW,0 );: NFyT: W0rr
58085 PRINTBL*;
58500 POKES(2),80:POKES(3),235:V2-235 : X2*80
58510 POKES(0),30:POKES(1), 190:POKES<16),1
38520 POKES(4),0:POKES < 5),132:X3-0
58530 POKES(28),1:POKES(97), 7 :pOK p S( 98),t
58340 PRINT"UflkSTINOS SCORE FEEDS *FES :
58550 PR I NT " *0kn»RtBRI"BS:
58600 POKES(21),7:POKEN(24) , 13:POKEN(4),0 :*>nvrK.cYS^o^w
59000 RETURN
39999 REM INTERRUPT SPRITE ROUTTNc
MICROMART
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We offer a selection of MODULA-2
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For more information call us.
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INTEGRATED SOFTWARE
42/45 New Broad Street, London EC2IV11QY
Tel: 01-628 0898
PROGRAM FILE
•
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•
•
•
•
•
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•
SW00 DPTP 12P, 159,74/141,28,3 A69, 152;l*T,2i,9,00,96,120, 159.49 . '
60010 DPTP 141,20;3.. 169;234,1.41,21,3,39,96,72,139,72,132;72; 169
60029 DPTP 0,141, 39 ,192,173,144,220,170;41;16;208,5,169,* .141.39
60030 DRTR192,198;41,8,208,39,1«9>1,141;37,192,173,16;200,74,144,fl,i 7 3;0.20R,2OT
60040 DPTP 41,192,176,20,173,0,208,24,109;38;192,141,0,208,144,0 '
60030 WTR173,16,208^9,1,141', 18,208,138,41,4,208,39,169, 8 ,141,37, 19 ?, 173 , i«. 288
60080 DRTP 74,176,8,173,0,208*203,40,1.92,144,20,173,8,208,36,237
60070 DPTp 38,192,141,0,208,!76,8,J 73,16,208,41,2*4,!41,16,208,13P
60080 DPTp 41,2,208,15,173,1,208,209,43,192,176,7,24,109,39.19?
60090 DPTP 141,1,208,138,41,1,208,13,173,1,209,205,42,192,144,?
60100 DPTP 36,237,30,192,141,1,209,104,168,104.170,!04,?6,49,234.23i ct
60999 REM BEE! SPRITE
61010 DflTp 0,0,0,128,0,0,128,0,0,32,0,0,33,64,0,37
61020 DPTP 69,0,37,83,64,37,83,0,170,85,0,41,83,160,41,103
61030 DPTP 105,1,103,103,2,103,103,0,159,104,0,41,160,0,130,32
61040 DPTp 0,130, 32 ,2,8,8,2,32,2,0,0,0,0,0.0,0
61099 REM BEE2 SPRITE
61100 DPTP 1,1,0.5,69,64,3,83,0.129,85,0.129,84,0.32
61110 DPTP 68,0,34,1.68,0,33,106,0,41,103,128,37,103,96,169,103
61120 DPTP 104,41,103,103,34,103,103,0,169,103,0.41,160,0.34.?2
61130 DPTP 0,130,32,0,136,32.0,136.8.0.0.0,0,8,0,P
61199 REM BEE3 SPRITE
61200 DPTP 0,0,0,0,0,2,0,0,2.0,0,8.0.« ,72,0
61210 DPTP 81,88,1,83,88,0,83,108,0,35;178,*8,85,!04.103,103
61228 DPTP 104,103,105,64,103,105,128,41,1.06,0,10,104.0,8,130,0
61230 BPTP 8,130,0.32.32.129,128.P.128.P.P.0.0,P.0.^
61299 REM BEE4 SPRITE
61300 DPTp 0,64,64,1,81,80,0,83,80,0,85,66,0,21,66,0
61310 DPTP 17,8,0,4!,136,0,169,72,2,103,104,9,!03,108,41,103
61320 DPTp 106,103,103,104,103,1&3,136,105,106,0,10,104,0,8.136,0
61330 DPTp 8,130,0,0,34,0,32,34.0.0.0.0,0.0.0,0
61399 REM SpiJOi SPRITS
61400 DPTP 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0.0,0,6,0,24,9
61410 DPTP 0,36,9,0,36,19,0.30,21,138,106,21,173,106,20,20!
61420 DPTP 202,20,109,138,20,63,10,4,30,0,4,0,8,0,0,0
61438 DPTP 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0
61499 REM SPU02 SPRITE
61300-DPTP 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0. 0 , 0 .0.6
61310 DPTP 0,24,13,0,60,13,128,44,13,138,108,21, !73,186,20,229
61320 DPTP 202,28,189,138,20,63,10,16.30,2,16,0.2,0,0 8
61330 DP T P 8,0,0,8,0,0,8,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0
61399 REM BIRD1 SPRITE
61600 DPTP 0,36,0,6,232,8,31,126,0,13,191,0,7,223,128,3
61610 DPTP 239,8,129,234,0.231..233,136,233,233,244,127,233,247.«27.2M3
61620 DPTP 254,127,233,233,233,233,236,227,233;128,!23,3!.0,0,9,0
61630 DPTP 0,4,128,0,2,64.0,7,112,0,10,168,0,0,8,0
61699 REM FLOWER SPRITE
61780 DPTP 0,8,0,0,28,0,0,62,0,3,190,224,7,221,240,7
61710 DPTP 221,248,7,233,240,3,233,224,12,233,132,31,62,124,63,233
61720 DPTP 234,3!,62,124,12,233,132,3.235,224,7,233,240,7,221.247
61730 DPTP 7,221,240,3,190,224,0,62,8,0,28,0,0,8,8,0
61799 REM DEPD BEE SPRITE
61808 DPTP 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,136,8,0,136,32.0,130.32,0
61810 DPTP 34,32,0,41,160,0,169,183,34,105,183,41,103,1.03,169,183
61828 DPTP 184,37,103,96,41,183,128,33,106,0,34,168,0,32,68,8
61938 DPTP 129,84,0,129,93,0,3,83,0,3,69,64,1,1,8,8,33079
REPDV.
•
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1
WT BBC Function key lister
r y by A Wood
'Function key lister' is a short and oftheBBC'sfunction keys. Instructions:
simple program to display the contents type it in and enter RUN.
10REM Function key titter
20REM .January 1984 By ft.C.G.Wood
30FORQV.*0TO39TEP3
40P’:*6oD02
30COPTQK
60.k ey show
70LDft#&FF • STR&72
30LDY&.70
90SEC < CRY#16 « BCC D * RTS * .0
100LDR4.B00 .• Y
110CHP#8«FF 1 BNE L0
120STR&71 •• 8Tfl8<72 : SEC ■ 90S P
130. L0 STfle«71
140LDY#0
130.LI
160CPY8c70*BEQ next
170LDR&800 , Y
180SEC
190CMP&71
200BCC next
210SEC
220CMP&72
230BCS next.
240STfi(L72
230.next INY
260CPY#8<11
270BNE LI
280. P
29QLDfl#32 = JSR&FFEE
300LDR#RSC"*" • JSR&FFEE
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
234 PC W
PROGRAM FILE
•
•
•
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•
•
3J.0LDR#R8C"K" * JSR8.FFEE
320LE>R#flSC ,, E" ’ JSR8.FFEE
330LDR#RSC"V"* JSR&FFEF
340LDR&70‘SEC * CMP#10 *BPL L 2
330CLC * ROC#RSC"0 il « J8R8.FFEE « SEC = PCS L3
360. L2 TRY « LDflflflSC" 1" •* JSR&FFEE * TVR
370CLC = RDC#RSC ,, 0"-10 * JBR&FFEE
380. L3 LDR#34 • J8R8.FFEE
390LDY8.71
400SEC » CPY8.72 * BEQ L6
410.L5 LDR&B01,V■SEC•CMP#32»BPL L.4
420TRX •’ LDR#RSC" ! " - JSRfcFFEF
430TXR«CLC■'RDC#64
440.L4 J3R&FFEE
4301 NY •• CPY&72 : BNE L3
460.L6 LDR#34 *JSR&FFEE*JSR&FFE7«RTS
470. list LDfl#0« 8TR8.70
480. K1 JSR keushow’ INC8*70 * L.0Y#16 * CPY8<70 • BNE Ki * RTS
490 1 > NEXT
Apple II Menu
by Mike Norris
This neat little routine for Apple users Pressing the space bar when the last
prsentsa menuofoptionsonthescreen menu item is highlighted returnsyouto
with one displayed in reverse mode, the first option.
This option can be selected by pressing The programs referee feels that it will
the RETURN key, or you can move on to help a user in selecting the right menu
another option by pressing the space option, as the highlighting focuses
bar.Thisthenhighlightsthenextchoice attention on one item at a time,
down in reverse mode, and so on.
120
LET STROBE = - 16368s LET KEY = - 16384
140
DIM MENU*<10)
•
1.60
DATA 5
180
DATA *** MAIN MENU ***
•
200
DATA GO FOR A WALK
220
DATA PLAY WITH THE COMPUTER
A
240
DATA WATCH T.V.
w
260
DATA READ A BOOK
280
DATA EXIT
•
300
REM
400
READ MANY
•
420
FOR J = 0 TO MANY
440
READ MENU* < J)
•
460
NEXT J
500
REM
520
GOSUB 10000
540
HOME s VTAB 10
560
PRINT "SO YOU WANT TO MENU*(CHOICE)
•
580
VTAB 23
600
END
•
990
REM
1 oooo
REM MENU
•
10020
HOME s VTAB 2: HTAB 20 - LEN <MENU*<0>> / 2
10040
INVERSE s PRINT MENU*<0)s NORMAL
A
10060
LET MODE = 0
W
10080
FOR J = 1 TO MANY
10100
GOSUB 20000
•
10120
NEXT
10140
VTAB 24s HTAB 1
•
10160
PRINT "SPACE BAR TO CHOOSE. RETURN TO GO"s
10180
LET CHOICE = 1
•
10200
LET MODE = Is LET J = CHOICE: GOSUB 20000
10220
POKE STROBE.0
10240
LET HIT = PEEK (KEY),
#
10260
IF HIT < 128 THEN GOTO 10240
10280
LET HIT = HIT - 128
•
10300
IF HIT < > 13 AND HIT < > 32 THEN GOTO 10220
10320
IF HIT = 13 THEN RETURN
•
10340
LET MODE = Os LET J = CHOICES GOSUB 20000
10360
LET CHOICE = CHOICE + 1
•
10380
IF CHOICE > MANY THEN LET CHOICE = 1
10400
GOTO 10200
19990
REM
#
20000
REM PRINT OPTION 7 J *
20020
VTAB 2 * J + 4s HTAB 20 - LEN <MENU*(J>> / 2
•
20040
IF MODE = 1 THEN INVERSE
20060
PRINT MENU* < J)
•
20080
NORMAL
20100
RETURN
•
29990
REM
63000
D* = CHR* (4): PRINT D*s PRINT D*s"SAVE MENU2"
•
MICROMART
C COMPILERS
We stock a wide range of C compilers
and utilities and can advise on which
will best suit your needs.
CP/M-80
AZTEC C II
£150
BDS C
£110
C/80 V3.1
£50
ECO-C
£185
Q/C
£90
CP/M-86
AZTEC C86
£180
&
Cl OPTIMIZING C86
£300
MS-DOS
DE SMET C88
£125
DIGITAL RESEARCH C
£210
LATTICE C
£395
MARK WILLIAMS CC86
£325
MICROSOFT C
£330
Call us for more information
GREY MATTER
1 4 Priqq Meadow, Ashburton, Devon TQ13 7DF I
I TEL (0364) 53499
The PC50 Library is a subset of the
internationally renowned NAG library and
offersapowerfulsetofprogrammingtoolsfor
the Fortran user on the Sirius. Can you afford
to be without
THE NAG FORTRAN PC50 LIBRARY
For full details write to:—
HARRISON-WARD
associates Ltd.
62 LYNTON ROAD, RAYNERS LANE,
HARROW, MIDDLESEX HA2 9NN
★ APRICOT VERSION AVAILABLE SOON *
WANTED
COMPUTER SYSTEMS
APPLE
SIRIUS
SUPERBRAIN
TELEVIDEO
IBM PC
OSBORNE
COMMODORE
HARDWARE
ACCESSORIES
FLOPPY DRIVES
WINCHESTERS
PRINTERS
ADD-IN PCB-S
Fair cash prices paid working or not.
Tel: 061-941 5732 (day)
062-587 8595 (night)
PCW235
DESK TOP SWITCH
UNITS
Get the most out of your VDU’s, Printers, Modems
or Processor systems by getting switched on to
Mayvision’s Switch Units
8 Line switching
2 Way RS232 £53.00
3 Way RS232 £62.00
4 Way RS232 £72.00
24 Line switching
2 Way RS232 £69.50
3 Way RS232 £81.50
4 Way RS232 £93.50
Centronics switch £86.50
(2 Way 35 Switch)
RS 232 Cables
9 line screened
25 line screened
1 Metre
£11.50
£18.45
2 Metre
£ 12.00
£19.95
3 Metre
£12.50
£21.45
Centronics Connectors
36 line I.D.C. Basic connector £16.00
36 line Ribbon +£1.25 per foot
Specify length & connectors (M/M, M/F, F/F) as required
Custom cables made to order, all lengths available on
request. Discounts available for multiple orders. Please
add 15% VAT to all items. Distributor enquiries welcome.
MAYVISION LTD.
Solent Works North Close
Lymington Hants S04 9BT
Tel: (0590) 78893
VERSATILE HIGH QUALITY RICOH PRINTERS
"Installed with care by our own engineers”
ft -
60 c.p.s.
35 c.p.s.
124 character double daisy wheel IEEE Centronics Parallel
Buffer pause RS 232 Serial 8K Buffer
These superb, high quality
daisy wheel printers will be
installed and maintained by
our own engineering team.
Options include auto
sheetfeeds, acoustic covers
and bi-directional page
feeders.
All prices exclude VAT.
25 c.p.s.
D.F.M. Ltd
4a, Anerley Station Road
Anerley
London SE20 8PT
dfm
Tel: 01-659 1227
DIKING PC2000
A new concept
64K RAM, twin disk drives
£795
Complete business system
with software, from
£1236
mMm:
• Runs BASIC CP/M. PASCAL
• Multi-operating systems
• Large software range
• Twin built-in disk drives
• 64K RAM expandable to 192K
• Separate low profile key¬
board
• Built-in printer port
• Full colour-RGB, composite
• High resolution monochrome
• 10 MByte hard disk
available
• Fully guaranteed
11095.00.
DERING SYSTCMS
Unit 22AA, Low Mill
Dewsbury,'WF13 3 LX
Phone (0924) 499366, ext. AA
Telex 83147 VIA OR,
This new economically priced systematises universally available software,
comprising many thousag(L-«f^rograms including CP/M. The addition of a
monitor and aopi»l«rTsaH that is repaired for a complete system. Prices start
at££j&4XTfor the PC2000. A complete business system with Microledger
iSccounfing software, printer and soft amber screen monitor would cost
£1236.00. The PC2000 with general purpose business software comprising
a spreadsheet, the 80 column word processor FORMAT 80 and ACCESS
datpbase - £1029.00. A top-of-the-ronge system including a 10 MByte
hard drive, daisywheel printer, monitor and universal software pack -
spreadsheet, word processor, database and accounting system would be
£2581.00.
This soundly built system is backed by the service and reputation of on
electronics company of 24 years standing.
EXPORT
ALL MAKES
OF
MICROCOMPUTERS
PRINTERS
PERIPHERALS
AND
SOFTWARE
SUPPLIED AT
DISCOUNT PRICES
DATASTAR SYSTEMS
UK
UNICOM HOUSE
182 ROYAL COLLEGE STREET
LONDON NW1 9NN
Telex: 295931 UNICOM G Tel: 01-4821711
( DATA-SWITCH
Link two or more micros to one printer, plotter, modem, etc. or vice versa
\
★ ROBUST CONSTRUCTION
★ SCREENED, METAL
HOUSING
★ FULLY TESTED
★ BI-DIRECTIONAL
★ 24-HOUR DESPATCH
★ CARRIAGE PAID
★ OFFICIAL ORDERS
ACCEPTED
SERIAL DATA: RS232 V24. 25 way D’ connectors (Female)
Lines 1 to
8 & 20.
All 25 lines.
Model R2
2 way switch
£59.95
Model V2
2 way switch
£79.95
Model R3
3 way switch
£69.95
Model V3
3 way switch
£99.95
Model R4
4 way switch
£79.95
Model V4
4 way switch
£119.95
Model R5
5 way switch
£89.95
Model V5
5 way switch (20 lines)
£139.95
Model RX
2 way crossover
£79.95
Model VX
2 way crossover
£109.95
PARALLEL DATA: CENTRONICS standard
36 way AMPHENOL connectors.
25 way D’
sockets for IBM PC.
Model C2
2 way switch
£99.95
Model P2
2 way switch
£79.95
Model C3
3 way switch
£119.95
Model P3
3 way switch
£99.95
Model C4
4 way switch
£139.95
Model P4
4 way switch
£119.95
Model C5
5 way switch
£159.95
Model P5
5 way switch
£139.95
Model CX
2 way crossover
£129.95
Model PX
2 way crossover
£109.95
DATA CABLES
24 hour desoatch on all cables listed below. Custom cables also made.
Serial Data Cables. RS232Y24. (25 way O’) 1 Metre 2 Metres 3 Metres
Lines 1 to 8 & 20 Screened multi-core. £11.95 £12.80 £13.65
All 25 lines. Screened multi-core. £19.95 £21.65 £23.35
All 25 lines. Ribbon cable £14.00 £15 20 £16 40
Printer cables. CENTRONICS Parallel.
Male/Male All 36 lines. Ribbon cable. £17.50 £19.50
Male/Male All 36 lines. Screened £24.95 £26.35
Sirius. 36 way to 36 way. Screened. £21.95 £22.95
IBM PC. 25 way to 36 way. Screened £24.95 £26.35
Samurai. 37 way to 36 way. Screened. £28.95 £30.35
PLEASE ADD VAT AT 15%. ALL ITEMS CARRIAGE PAID.
N/A
£27.75
£23.95
£27.75
£31.75
HOMESTEAD ELECTRONICS
24, OXFORD RD., DENHAM,
UXBRIDGE, MIDDLESEX.
Phone I0895)832375
RAY
QUA
AUTHORISED DEALERS
V FOR TELEVIDEO. EPSON
StARHEWLETT.-PACKARD.
COMPUTWU LTT>
LITY/SERVICE/PRODUCTS
PART OF OUR VAST RANGE
IBM—
MEMORY EXPANSION 128K
£183
PC 1XT EXPRESS 128K
£590
MEGAPLUS 128K
£340
HERCULES BOARD
£380
IRMA BOARD
£920
PRINTERS— DIRECTOR DAISYWHEEL 40
£800
MATRIX 80 COL
£200
EPSON MX 100
£400
BROTHER HR15
£410
SOFTWARE— WORDSTAR
£260
WORDPLUS PC
£350
OPEN ACCESS
£400
LOTUS 123
£350
ENERGRAPHICS
£330
COMPUTER— COMPAQ 256K
£2125
TELEVIDEO TS 804
£3750
DAYSTAR COMPUTERS LTD.
UNITS 4 and 5. NEW ROAD.
NEWHAVEN. SUSSEX. BN9 OEU.
PLEASE TEL: 0273-514874
USED
MICROCOMPUTER
SYSTEMS
We buy, sell and part exchange
used business microcomputer
systems
8 + 16 Bit micros
available from
stock
Dot matrix and daisy wheel
printers
Wide range of software
INTERLEX
Imperial House
Lower Teddington Road, Kingston
Surrey KT1 4EP
Telephone: 01-943 4366
PC W 237
BACK ISSUES SERVICE
Here is a guide to PCW back issues. Hardware reviews/Benchtests are indexed by manufacturer,
software byproduct name.
MANUFACTURER
A
PRODUCT
ISSUE
Acorn
Speech System
January 1984
Acorn
Electron
October 1983
Acorn
BBC Micro
January 1982
Acorn
TeletextAdaptor
April 1984
Acorn
BBC Speech Chips
April 1983
ACT
Apricot
October 1983
ACT
Sirius 1
February 1982
Adman Electronics
Adman Speech
Synthesiser
January 1984
AGF
Programmable Joystick
December 1983
AMS
Disc Drive: 3in
January 1984
Apple
Lisa
July 1983
Apple
III
May 1982
Apple
Macintosh
D
March 1984
British Micro
b
Mimi801
July 1982
Brother
EP44
r
April 1984
C/WP
V
Cortex
December 1983
Camputers
Lynx
March 1983
Canon
AS-100
December 1983
Canon
CX-1
November 1982
Canon
X-07
March 1984
Casio
PB-100
May 1983
Casio
fx-9000p
February 1983
Casio
602p
May 1982
Casio
FP-10 Printer
April 1982
Coleco
Adam
April 1984
Commodore
715
January 1984
Commodore
64
May 1983
Compudata
Tulipsystem 1
October 1983
Conchess
Monarch/Ambassador/
Escourter
March 1983
Corvus
Concept
March 1983
Currah
Microspeech Unit
ft
January 1984
Dacom Systems
D
Buzzbox
January 1984
DCP Microdevelopments
Speech Pack
August 1982
Digihurst
Microsight 1
October 1983
Digital Equipment
RainbowlOO
November 1982
Dragon Data Ltd
Dragon 32
c
August 1982
Eaca International
E
ColourGenie
June 1983
Electroni-Kit
FX System
November 1983
Electroplay
MyTalking Computer
November 1983
Epson
QX-10
July 1983
Epson
HX-20
December 1982
Epson
FX-80
July 1983
Epson
PX-8
E
June 1984
Ferranti
r
ArgusPPC
November 1983
Fidelity
Prestige
February 1983
Fortune
Fortune32:16
August 1983
Future
FX20
October 1983
Gavilan
b
Gavilan MC
February 1984
GCE
Vectrex System
August 1983
GCS
Ferrett
June 1984
Gemini
Multiboard
February 1982
GRiD
Compass
June 1984
Gulfstream
Hyperion
II
October 1983
Hewlett-Packard
H
HP-75C
November 1982
Hewlett-Packard
15Cand16C
September 1982
Hewlett-Packard
H
HP86
October 1982
Hewlett-Packard
HP-125
April 1982
Hewlett-Packard
HP-IL
March 1982
HighTech Electronics
Sid 1 Colour Board
April 1982
Hitachi
MB16001
June 1983
Hitachi
Peach
|
May 1982
IBM
1
9000 Instrumentation
March 1983
Computer
IBM
PCJunior
March 1984
Ikon
Hobbit
January 1984
10 Research Ltd
Pluto
1
December 1982
Jonos
J
Jonos
April 1984
JupiterCantab
Ace
I
January 1983
LSI
L
M-Four
April 1983
M
MagusComputer Systems Add-On Graphics Board
1 trl
September 1983
MannesmannTally
MT160L Dot-Matrix Printer
August 1983
Mattel
Aquarius
November 1983
Microwriter Ltd
Microwriter
September 1982
Milton Bradley
Phantom
July 1983
Monroe
Monroe 8820
April 1982
Motorola
MC68000
December 1982
Multitech
Micro-Professor II
y
September 1983
NCR
N
Decision Mate V
August 1983
NEC
PC-8201A
December 1983
NEC
APC
September 1983
NottingDaleltec
G007 Graphics Module
March 1983
Novag
Constellation
October 1983
0
Olivetti
M20
September 1982
Oric Products
Oriel
April 1983
Osborne
Executive
D
July 1983
Positron
r
9000
n
October 1982
Robocom Ltd
K
Bit Stik
c
November 1982
Sage
b
II
February 1983
Scisys
ChessChampion Mark5
January 1983
Semi-Tech
Pied Piper
September 1983
Sharp
MZ-700
February 1984
Sharp
PCI 251
February 1983
Sharp
PC1500
June1982
Sharp
MZ-80A
June 1982
Sharp
MZ-80A
April 1984
Shelton Instruments
Sig/Net
April 1983
Sinclair
Microdrive
October 1983
Sinclair
ZX Spectrum
June1982
Sinclair
ZX81 Printer
January 1982
SMT
Goupil-3
December 1983
Sord
M5
August 1983
Sord
Exleigh Expert
August 1982
Spectravideo
SV-318andSV-328
T
March 1984
Tandata
1
Homedeck
April 1984
PCW
T
W X
Tandy
MC-10
November 1983
Walters Microsystems
120 Printer
December 1982
Tandy
Model 100
August 1983
Watanabe
Personal Plotter
February 1982
Texas Instruments
Tl Professional
May 1983
Wave Mate
Bullet
February 1984
Texas Instruments
TI-88
July 1982
William Stuart Systems
Chatterbox
January 1984
Texas Instruments
TI-99/4A
March 1982
Wren Computers
Wren
April 1984
Texas Instruments
TI-59
January 1983
Xerox
16/8
February 1984
Torch Computers
Torch
January 1983
Xerox
820
January 1982
Tradecom
NewbrainAD
July 1982
Tycom
Microframe
January 1984
SOFTWARE
PROGRAM
ISSUE
1-2-3
April 1984
1-2-3
November 1983
1982 Database Roundup
December 1982
1983 Database Roundup
December 1983
1983 Spreadsheet
December 1983
Roundup
A
i
Accountancy Programs
ft
June 1983
(General)
Aquila
September 1982
D
Benchmarks Explained
D
January 1984
(Reference Article)
Beta
August 1983
Brainstorm
February 1984
Busifile
January 1984
Busipost
l
February 1983
r
\
Cardbox
Li
August 1982
Color Scarfman
December 1982
CondorDatabase
November 1982
Databases(ChoosingOne)
D
March 1982
Dataplan
August 1983
Dataprism
March 1983
DBMS2
June 1982
Delta
October 1983
Desq
December 1983
DMS
March 1982
Dragon Disks
June 1984
E40
£
September 1982
Ecalc
July 1983
Everyman
February 1984
Expert-Ease
June 1984
r
Falc
r
January 1984
Financial Director
June 1983
FMS80
April 1982
Freqout
February 1982
II
Homeword
H P41 -C Text E d itor
Home Accounts/Finance
Manager
* * February 1984
November 1982
January 1984
Personal Computer World Specials : 1984 M icrocom puter
Benchtest Special: (£2.40 incp&p)—20 leading micros
reviewed by the PCW team. Desktop Computing: (£2.25 inc
p&p)—comprehensiveguideto using microsin your
business. Binders: (£3.95each incp&p)—keep your
copies in order with these strong, attractive yellow
binders.
1 L
Information Management
April 1984
Infostar
September 1983
Lisawrite
August 1983
M
MasterPlanner
April 1984
MasterPlanner
October 1983
Mathemagic/Graphmagic
August 1983
Micro FCS
October 1983
Micropen
May 1983
Microscript
May 1983
Microtax
July 1983
MS-DOS &CP/M-86
October 1982
MS-DOS2
May 1983
Moneywise
June 1984
Multiplan
April 1983
O
Omnis
July 1983
Open Access
June 1984
Optimum
D
November 1983
r
Peachcalc
March 1984
Pearl
October 1982
Perfect Calc
October 1983
Personal Data Base
March 1984
Petspeed
April 1983
Plannercall
May 1983
Prophet II
D
March 1983
If
Rescue
April 1983
Revelation
c
April 1984
Sage400 (Accounting)
October 1983
Scred
August 1983
Scripsit2.0
February 1982
SearchandFind
December 1983
Select
September 1982
Silicon Office
July 1982
System Builder
June 1984
Software Various
April 1984
Superdeflex
January 1983
Superfile
f
January 1983
TheFinancial Planner ■
December 1983
The Spreadsheet
September 1983
TK! Solver
February 1984
Tomorrow's Office
If
June 1983
v
View
August 1983
VisiOn
November 1983
VisiCalc
June 1983
Visuall
February 1984
Vu-Calc(for Spectrum)
w
September 1983
Word Handler II
March 1983
Word
June 1984
Wordspell
March 1984
Workslate
January 1984
dBasell
May 1982
Anyone issue£1.50; all additional issuesfl .00 each.
Benchtest special £2.40. Desktop Computing £2.25.
Binders£3.95 each. All prices include post and package.
"Overseas orders requiring Air Mail postage add £1.00 per
copy.Cheques/PO payableto Computing Publications Ltd,
i
i —
| Name_
I
53/55 Frith Street, London W1A2HG. Please allow
upto3weeksfordeliveryanddon'tforgetto state your
nameandfulladdresswithyourorder.Stateclearlyona
separatepieceofpapertheissue(s)you require and
encloses cheque/PO.
-Address.
PCW
The True And HighTec 16 Bit. ..
... FROM JAPAN’S MOST ADVANCED AND WELL-KNOWN MICRO/MINI COMPUTER
MANUFACTURER, PANAFACOM, TIED UP WITH SAKATA.
Processor
Intel 8086 running at 8 MHz
RAM memory
128 K expandable to 512 K
Operating
System
MS-DOS Ver 1.25/2.00
CP/M-86
Display Unit
Super high resolution
colour or monochrome,
640 x 400 pixels.
Keyboards
ASCII, UK, French and German.
Other local keyboards available
on request.
Communication
2-serial port and one Centronics
parallel port as standard.
IEEE-488 is optional.
System expansion Unit
Disks
2 x 720 Kbyte floppy disk
10 and 20 M byte Winchester
disks are optional.
Expansion Unit 5 expansion slots and 10 M byte
Winchester disk with Cache
memory.
jm '\u
Complete System with Color-Graphic
Integrated Desk Top Micro as well as portable
for your business, supported by different applica¬
tion packages.
Fastest speed with excellent colour capability
and full range of softwares.
Well designed to meet current and future
demand.
Quality micro with reasonable price you have
never seen.
Software
BASIC-86, Advanced BASIC. L-II COBOL.
FORMS-2, ANIMATOR, Multiplan, WordStar,
SpellStar, MailMerge, TSS support p rogram,
1-3270 emulator
IEEE-488 BOARD
MS-DOS. BASIC-86 and Multiplan are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation
Wordstar. MailMerge and SpellStar are trademarks of MicroPro International
Corporation LEVEL II COBOL, FORMS-2 and ANIMATOR are trademarks of
Micro Focus Limited. CP/M-86 is a trademark of Digital Research Inc.
Duet-16 is a trademark of SAKATA SHOKAI. LTD
SAKATA SHOKAI GmbH
Kleinhulsen 15, D-4010 Hilden, West Germany
Tel. 010 49 2103 5730 Tlx 8581689 Sktd Telefax 02 11 -32 59 19
SAKATA UK Rep Office: 48 Sutton Park. Broad Blunsdon, Swindon. Wiltshire SN2
1 COUPON
Please send us more information about:
1 □ DUET-16
□ Printers
□ Monitors
□ Plotters
□ Floppy-Disk Drive
1 Name
City:
| Street
Phone: PCW9/84
4W. Tel: 0793 721419. Tlx: 449666.
i
Other products: low-cost peripherals - printers, plotters, monitors and floppy-disk drives. Now available. Please enquire.
MAKE SURE YOUR
HOME COMPUTER
WORKS... FOR
YEARS AND YEARS
Guarantee years of service from your home computer.
Protect your investment by joining the MICRO REPAIR CLUB.
After your warranty has run out can you afford the manufacturers’
repair charges which can be as high as £60 minimum?
THE MICRO REPAIR CLUB is a brand new organisation offering a
unique scheme which guarantees that should your computer break
down, it will be repaired at absolutely no cost.
THE MICRO REPAIR CLUB has been formed to save you money
and ensure that your computer is in tip-top working condition for
years to come.
A one-year membership that guarantees all repairs to your
micro costs only £24.95, with an annual renewal of £14.95.
A two-year membership costs £35.95, three years £46.95.
For incredible value for money a four-year membership costs
only £57.95.
All prices are inclusive of VAT
THE MICRO REPAIR CLUB is backed by one of the world’s largest
insurance groups and the actual repair work will be carried out by
Computeraid Services, a division of Thorn EMI Information
Technology Ltd.
There can be no greater protection. So if you own a Sinclair, BBC,
Acorn, Dragon, Commodore or any other home computer join the
Club by ringing the HOTLINE on 01 -946 7777 or clip the coupon
below and send it to:
Micro Repair Club Limited, Swan Court, Mansel Road, Wimbledon,
THE m JipissK:
MICRO
REPAIR
mmmmmm CLUB mmmmmm
A FEW WORDS
IN YOUR SHELL
BEWILDERED BY BUZZ-WORDS?
CONFUSED BY THE CHOICE?
PUZZLED BY PERIPHERALS?
Then contact FORCE 4 and get our friendly
and expert help
Need a faster, more versatile matrix printer for your IBM PC?
-Call FORCE 4
What about a dual-role printer, with correspondence-
quality printing plus the speed of a matrix machine?
-Call FORCE 4
Want a medium or high resolution colour monitor for your
Micro, including the IBM PC?
-Call FORCE 4
Do you need a fully-featured VDU with lots of popular
emulations?
-Call FORCE 4
High capacity disk system for the IBM PC? What about 26
Mbytes Fixed plus 26 Mbytes Exchangeable, using an ANSI
8" cartridge—fully compatible with existing software?
-Call FORCE 4
Have you been seeking a good low-cost colour printer thats
really quiet?
-Call FORCE 4
Have you been looking for a supplier with comprehensive
workshop facilities who will give really effective back-up?
-Call FORCE 4
These are some of the famous names whose products we
supply and support with a FULL 1 YEAR WARRANTY:
Amcodyne, Canon, Deccacolour, Dyneer, Epson,
Fidelity, Hazeltine, Integrex, OKI, Sanyo, Seiko Silver
Reed & Tatung.
r — — —-—-_____
_ I would like to join the MICRO REPAIR CLUB for_years and look
| forward to receiving my full membership pack.
| I enclose a cheque for £24.95 CD One year’s membership*
£35.95 CH Two years £46.94 CH Three years £57.95 EH Four years
I Made payable to Micro Repair Club Limited ‘Please tick relevant box
| Please debit my Visa/Access card No:_... --
Name_-
I Address___
I own a_home computer and it is in working order.
I
I
I
I
I
I
j
Got a peripheral or accessories problem?
Call FORCE 4
A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH
Force 4 Computer Services Limited
Victory House
Somers Road North
Portsmouth
POl 1PJ
Telephone: (0705) 839135
Telex: 858902 BARON-G
FF 3813 84
PC W 241
M.F. 10
Floppy
Disk Box
Holds 10-
5'A" Disks
£ 2.45
Incl. VAT, Post
&. Packing
M.F. 50
Floppy
Disk Box
Holds 50-
5'A" Disks
£ 9.50
Incl.VAT, Post
Packing
M.D. 12/30
Micro
Disk Box
Holds 12 to 30-
3)4" Disks according
to thickness
£ 7.85
Incl.VAT, Post
Packing
Rockfort Diskfile Range of products
not only offer an easy reference and attractive
disk filing system but also offer complete
protection from damaging dust particles.
Post for your order today!
ROCKFORT
LAJdiskpstorage
Manufactured by Projectron Ltd — Trade inquiries invited
! * pcw |
; ROCKFORT PRODUCTS — Member of the Vignesh j
Group, 30 Topsfield Parade, London, N.8. Tel: 01-348 0543
CODE NO.
DESCRIPTION
QTY
PRICE
£ P
M.F. 10
5'/ 4 " DISK BOX
M.F. 50
5'/ 4 " DISK BOX
M.D. 12/30
MICRO DISK BOX
TOTAL
PLEASE FORWARD THE ROCKFORT DISK BOX/S
AS INDICATED ABOVE. I ENCLOSE CHEQUE VALUE £
NAME_
ADDRESS,
-POSTCODE,
Honeywell Compuprint:
the printer
every computer deserves.
The Compuprint Series I printers are compatible with all systems.
They are designed at Pregnana Milanese and produced at the Caluso factory in
Italy. Series I is available in 4 models: L11 I, L12 CQ I, L32 CQ I, 34 CQ.
Printing is the final stage of a
written work.
For this reason, the printer
is very important.
It must immediately translate
data sent by the controller
in the most legible form, the
quietest way, and every time it
is required.
All these features are to be
found in the Compuprint
Series I from Honeywell
Information Systems Italia.
An evolutionary line of dot
matrix serial printers, capable
of adapting with ease to all
computers, from micro and
personal computers to the
largest mainframe.
Compuprint is a further
example of Honeywell’s
unceasing search for increased
performance.
It offers a wide choice of type
faces, providing just the one
to suit a particular need.
A “Letter quality” feature is
available.
The double pass of the new
nine needle head guarantees
clearer definition - and a more
attractive document.
Compuprint can print either
single sheets or continuous
feed with no duty cycle
limitation.
Every computer deserves the
Compuprint from Honeywell
Information Systems Italia.
And many of them already
have it.
Compuprint is represented
in the United Kingdom by:
Honeywell Information Systems
Italia - Matrix Printers Operation
Maxted RD, Hemel
Hempstead, Herts HP2 7DZ
Tel. 0442 - 42291/5 - Tlx 82413
and is distributed by:
Geveke Electronics Ltd.
RMC House, Vale Farm Road
Woking, Surrey GU21 1DW
Ego Computer Systems Ltd.
Stirling Way Borehamwood
Herts WD6 2BT
Tel. 01-2074433/66 - Tlx 261215
Rotec International Ltd.
15 Osyth Close
Blackmills Industrial Estate
Northampton NN4 ODY
titcippkz PRICES SLASHED!
AND FOR WORK FOR HOME FOR EVERYWHERE IN BETWEEN
Si'**
THE APPLE lie
128 K RAM AS STANDARD • 2 SERIAL PORTS
BUILT IN 5V4" DISK DRIVE • TAKES MOUSE, JOYSTICK, PADDLES
40 AND 80 COLUMNS • LIBRARY OF 10,000 PROGRAMS
TRANSPORTABLE —WEIGHS 7lbs • 12" LONG 1 1VY' WIDE 2V4" HIGH
THE TOTAL SOLUTION IN ONE BOX
only £789
For computerised solutions to business problems contact
SIMMONS MAGEE COMPUTERS LTD
13 YORK STREET, TWICKENHAM, MIDDLESEX TW1 3JZ
01 - 891-4477
All prices exclusive of VAT
UNIVERSITY
CHALLENGE
WINNERS.
After evaluating many makes of disc drive,
Cambridge University computer laboratory chose
Opus.
They were selected because of their
competitive prices, reliability and quality of after
sales service.
Their range of disc drives have been tested
to the limit-running for 8,000 hours.
That is a year of constant use without
failure.
And they can be bought as single or dual
drive and vary from 100K to 1.6 Megabyte,
catering for the beginner to a tutor requiring a
system for the largest of classroom networks.
All this is backed up by a two year guarantee
on every drive - that’s a year more than any other
company can offer.
3 MICRO DRIVE. (ALL PRICES INCLUDE VAT & CARRIAGE.)
Double sided 40 Track Drive Single drive_£>229.95
Dual drive_£>459.95
5*/4 SINGLE DISC DRIVES.
5400 100K Single sided 40 Track_£,129.95
5401 100K Single sided 40 Track_£>149.95
5402 200K Double sided 40 Track_£,169.95
5802 400K Double sided hardware switchable 80/40 Track_£>199.95
5V4" dual disc drives.
5401D 200K/400K on line Single sided 40 Track_£>349.95
5402D 400K/800Kon line Double sided 40 Track_£>399.95
5802D 800K/1.6 Megabyte on line Double sided hardware
switchable 80/40 Track_£>499.95
Opus products are available from WH.Smith,
Spectrum,John Menzies, Allders, Boots and other
good computer stores
nationwide.
158 Camberwell Road, London SK5 OEE.
01 701 8668 or 01 703 6155.
Alternatively, you
can find your nearest
stockist by contacting us
at the address opposite.
GET RICH
WITH YOUR
COMPUTER!
The bestselling American manual on making a fortune in the booming micro
business: The Computer Entrepreneur Manual (quote: "If you've been thinking
about entering this lucrative business, this manual will make you do it," -Chicago
Sun Times). The UK edition in deluxe ring binder contains the unabridged original
edition and additional UK material.
Covers over 100 lucrative computer businesses: consulting, free-lance pro¬
gramming, computer store, word processing service and many more with start-up
instructions, success stories, profit estimates, suppliers (never pay retail again—
even while starting your business), marketing, pitfalls to avoid, how missing
technical experience need not stand in your way, financing (‘ shoestring’’ bud¬
gets, too) and much more. £22.95 + £2 P&P.
We also offer other services for computer businesses:
The Computer Entrepreneur Journal and Newsletter. Keep up with the latest
exciting computer opportunities, the best deals from suppliers, franchises, money¬
making tips for consultants and programmers, opportunities in import/export, re¬
tailing, mail order. £28/year + £2.80 P&P. Ask for a free two Issue sample sub¬
scription with your purchase of the manual (just mark renewal invoice "cancel” if
you decide to discontinue after trial).
Join The Computer Entrepreneur Society, the only international association for
computer businesses. Intro membership only £39.50 per year (+ £3 P&P), which
includes the above manual and a full one year (!) subscription to the Journal
(these benefits alone are worth £51!). You also get an extensive number of other
benefits (for example access to the world’s largest library of computer business
books/tapes) plus a free cassette tape seminar with US micro millionaire. Bill
Gates (Microsoft, the inventor of MS-DOS), and one free manual (a £12.50 value)
from the following new titles (indicate your choice with order):
■ The Computer Entrepreneur Software Writers Market (where and how to sell
your programs); ■ Moonlighting with your Micro (profitable part-time ventures you
can start); ■ Computer Consulting and Opportunities Abroad (charge £200, £300
or more per day). Additional manuals £11.25 for new members, £12.50 + 80p P&P
for non-members.
Send cheque/PO or Visa/Access/Eurocard info (include signature and expiration
date) to:
THE COMPUTER ENTREPRENEUR, Attn: Circulation Dept
42-45 New Broad Street, London EC2M 1QY
Catalogue and introductory package available for £3 (credited at
subsequent purchase).
(Orders from outside Europe: mail direct to The Computer Entrepreneur, Attn:
Circulation Dept., PO Box 456., Grand Central Terminal, New York, NY 10163,
USA).
246 PC W
DESPATCHED WITHIN FOUR HOURS
OVER FOR DISKINGS 4-HOUR EXPERIENCE
DISKING NEWS
We ship the worlds’ best diskettes FASTER than anybody. We ALWAYS enclose a VAT invoice and current price list. It’s
not “Yes sir we’re expecting delivery in 4-6 weeks” or “Please allow 28 days for delivery’’ - What rubbish we put up with in
the U K.? 1 Just ring another company in this magazine - we did. We purchased a modem advertised on another page - two
months later we’ve still no modem OR explanation. AND we can’t leave a message they’ve no answering machine!
EVERTHING you see in this ad. is ON THE SHELF NOW We despatch within FOUR working hours or we’ll ship FREE!'
Write or call (24 hrs) for our general price list. Coming soon - The new Microdisk SEE 10 library box PLUS Disking Business
Diskettes - They’ll blow your mind.
FREE with EVERY ten-pack of diskettes from DISKING
SEE 10 LIBRARY BOX
The award winning device for storing and displaying ten diskettes. Available
individually at £2.50 exc VAT see under Diskette Storage
PLUS
DISKING COLOUR CODERS
DISKING
SUPER PROMOTION
FREE CLOCK
VALUE £8.95
With every TWO Ten-Packs' of ANY 3 V 2 ", 5W or 8" disks by Verbatim,
Memorex, Dysan or Maxell purchased at these prices, we will pack a Super
Disking Calendar Clock worth £8.95 absolutely FREE.
Order four Ten-Packs, and you will receive two Calendar Clocks and so on.
'Excluding diskettes purchased from bargain corner All FREE offers are
subject to availability
A multicoloured pack of ten fibre tipped pens for colour coding your diskette
labels available individually at 49p per pack of ten exc VAT
MEMOREX
MEMORY EXCELLENCE
Memorex diskettes are everyones favourite and work well in ALL computer
systems.
5’'« INCH DISKETTES
Certified for single OR double density and with hub ring reinforcement
PRICES EXC VAT
10-40
50-90
100+
3481
S/S
48 tpi
.. 21.90
20.90
19.90
3491
D/S
48 tpi
. . 27.90
26.90
25.90
3504
S/S
96 tpi
. . 27.90
26.90
25.90
3501
D/S
96 tpi
. . 35.90
34.90
33.90
48 tpi suitable for 35 or 40 track operation
96 tpi suitable for 77 or 80 track operation
10 and 16 Hard Sector available at same prices
MEMOREX 3’ V MICRODISKS - HERE AT LAST’
PRICES EXC VAT 10-40 50-90 100+
6100 S/Sided ... 42.90 41.90 40.90
0 5M Byte rating auto shutter
3’ ?" library boxes coming soon
FREE
To celebrate three successful years with Memorex we are giving away a
Memorex C-90 cassette tape with every ten-pack of Memorex floppies This
offer does not affect any of our other promotions, and is in addition to them
DISKING Means
Business
DISKETTE STORAGE
NEW DISKING SWING LID BOX for 60
minidisks, comes with keys, dividers,
tags and even built in carrying handles.
At our price the best value around —
Recommended Price £22.50.
D.S.L.B — £17.90
buy 3 and get fourth one free. Post & Packing at 4 unit rate.
SEE 10 LIBRARY BOX Free with every pack of
ten diskettes this superb storage device keeps
dust out. yet enables instant selection
ABA Lockable diskette storage come in two sizes for each of
the minidisks and 8" disks. They hold either 40 or 80 diskettes
Part No
Description
Price
M35
40 minidisk capacity
14.90
Part No. Description
Price
M85
80 minidisk capacity
18.90
SEE 10 Library Box
2.50
F40
40 8" diskette capacity
18.90
LB8
Library Box (not SEE 10 design)3.00
DISKETTE ACCESSORIES
PERFECT DATA’ CLEANING KIT
The one that really works well in ALL drives - get it now before the gremlins
strike
Part No Description Price
CK5 For 5VV' disk drives 14.90
CK8 For 8" disk drives 14.90
5y«” DISKING SUPERMAILERS
Very rigid copyright design, takes up to 4 disks
' 'N
DISKING DISKWRITERS'
Packed in 25 s and sold in 50’s, these superb blue or black pens are 100°° safe
for use on diskette labels Please state ink colour when ordering
Part No Description Price
DW 50-pack Diskwriters 9.90
5Va" or 3V 2 " DISKETTES
1-2 packs each pack at 95p
3-5 packs each pack at 75p
6-9 packs each pack at 60p
10+ packs POST FREE
5V4" CLEANING KITS
same as 5W' diskettes
U K. SHIPPING RATES INC. INS. BUT EXC VAT
5V4" SEE 10 LIBRARY BOXES
1-4 off at 40p each
5- 9 off at 30p each
10+ off at 20p each
8" DISKETTES
1-2 packs each at pack at 1.60
3-5 packs each pack at 1.20
6- 9 packs each pack at 90p
10+ packs POST FREE
8" CLEANING KITS
same as 8” diskettes
8" LIBRARY BOXES
1-4 off at 60p each
5-9 off at 45p each
10+ off at 30p each
DISKING SUPERMAILERS
100-pack 3.00
LOCKABLE STORAGE (all versions)
1 off 2.00 each
2-7 off 1.30 each
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DISKING COLOUR CODERS
25p each -5+ POST FREE
DISKING DISKWRITERS
50-pack 1.00
maxell
Verbatim
DYSAN - THE THE DISCERNING
With new lower prices Dysans impeccable reputation is now a genuine
bargain
5 '4 INCH DISKETTES
MAXWELL - THE GOLD STANDARD
Maxell’s very high quality control ensures all standards are met and surpassed
5 ’4 INCH DISKETTES
Certified for Single OR Double Density All with Hub Ring reinforcement
DATALIFE - FIVE YEAR WARRANTY
The world market leaders, with perfect data retention time after time - for a
lifetime
5 ’4 INCH DISKETTES
Certified for Single OR Double Density 48 tpi with Hub Ring reinforcement
PRICES EXC VAT
10-40
50-90
100+
Certified for single OR double density and with hub ring reinforcement
PRICES EXC VAT
10-40
50-90
100+
MD1-D S/S
48 tpi
. . 24.90
23.90
22.90
PRICES EXC VAT
10-40
50-90
100+
104/ID S/S 48 tpi
23.90
22.90
21.90
MD2-D D/S
48 tpi
. . 32.90
31.90
30.90
MD525 S/S 48 tpi
22.90
21.90
20.90
104/2D D/S 48 tpi
34.90
33.90
32.90
MD1-DD S/S
96 tpi
. 32.90
31.90
30.90
MD550 D/S 48 tpi
29.90
28.90
27.90
204/ID S/S 96 tpi
34.90
33.90
32.90
MD2-DD D/S
96 tpi
. 42.90
41.90
40.90
MD577 S/S 96 tpi
28.90
27.90
26.90
204/2D D/S 96 tpi
48 tpi suitable for 35 or 40 track operation
42.90
41.90
40.90
MD2-HD D/S
1 6MByte.
. 59.00
56.00
53.00
MD557 D/S 96 tpi
48 tpi suitable for 35 or 40 track operation
36.90
35.90
34.90
96 tpi suitable for 77 or 80 track operation
10 and 16 Hard Sector available at same prices
8 INCH DISKETTES
PRICES EXC VAT 10-40
3740/ID S/S D/Dens ... 32.90
3740/2D D/S D/Dens . . . 40.90
32 Hard Sector available at same prices
50-90
31.90
39.90
100 +
30.90
38.90
48 tpi suitable for 35 or 40 track operation
96 tpi suitable for 77 or 80 track operation
8 INCH DISKETTES
PRICES EXC VAT 10-40 50-90 100+
FD1-128 S/SS/Dens ... 29.90 28.90 27.90
FD1-1XD S/S D/Dens ... 34.90 33.90 32.90
FD2-XDD D/S D/Dens . . . 39.90 38.90 37.90
96 tpi suitable for 77 or 80 track operation
10 & 16 Hard Sector available at same prices
8 INCH DISKETTES
PRICES EXC VAT 10-40
FD32-9000 S/S S/Dens ... 31.90
FD34-8000 S/S D/Dens ... 31.90
DD34-4001 D/S D/Dens . . . 36.90
20-M BYTE HARD DISKS FOR YOUR MICRO
5-MB
10-MB
15-MB
20-MB
Part No:
DS505
DS510
DS515
DS520
Prices exc VAT
APPLE II
1190.00
1290.00
1390.00
1490.00
IBM-PC
1290.00
1390.00
1490.00
1590.00
SIRIUS/VICT.
1190.00
1290.00
1390.00
1490.00
EPSON QX10
1190.00
1290.00
1390.00
1490.00
DEC LSI 11
1390.00
1490.00
1590.00
1690.00
Z80 System
1190.00
1290.00
1390.00
1490.00
SI00 System
1290.00
1390.00
1490.00
1590.00
Slaves may be added at these lower prices
990.00
1090.00
1190.00
1290.00
Complete with intelligent controller, host adaptor power supply unit. fan.
cabling, software and User Manual Free delivery in the UK
DISKING INTERNATIONAL
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Hospitals the Utilities. Research Establishments Armed Forces the Ministries
and Local Authorities world-wide We will despatch within 4 (YES 4) working
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please post or telephone us your order and we wlj send a pro-forma invoice by
return for your accounts department to pay against
CREDIT CARD ORDERS
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Stick on your computer
You may call 365 days a year 24 hours a day and you may speak for as long as
you like when you leave the following details -
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2 Cardholder Name & Address
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You may leave the rest to US!!
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FIRST CLASS RATES
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5VSf
8"
First Ten-Pack
2.00
2.50
2nd and subsequent
Ten-Pack
1.50
2.00
TRAPE CORNER
FREE AEROPLANE
Don't keep sitting there in front of your VDU get outside and fly our aeroplane
Just call and ask for your flier and we ll send you our latest trade pack with
prices special offers and sample unlabelled diskette and mailer We ll also
enclose a DPC application form telling you how to buy at our 10 000 prices yet
order only in 50 s
BARGAIN CORNER
5V«" SUPERLUXE DISK LIBRARIES
Diskette binders at £4 90 each (normally £9 90) p&p 50p each 10 - post free
5V«" DISKETTES
Supplied in a FREE SEE 10 library box
PRICES EXC VAT 10-40 50-90 100+
S/S 48 tpi Diskettes 13.90 12.90 11.90
D/S 48 tpi Diskettes 20.90 19.90 18.90
Don't be fooled - these diskettes are brand new and come with our normal full
money-back guarantee They are mostly non hub ring labelled or unlabelled
BASF. Dysan Rhone Poulenc Memorex etc where the boxes have had the
cellophane removed We are even supplying them in a FREE SEE 10 library
box" At these prices you can't lose - Hurry 1 2 3 4 5 6
To-DISKING FREEPOST. Liphook. Hants,GU30 7BR.U.K
Qty
Description
Price exc VAT
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Total Delivery and insurance
Sub Total exc VAT
VAT
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NAME
ADDRESS
TEL NO:
Or please charge my credit card No
E32
Access .VISA & Diners Cards Welcome
NEWS
NEWS
NEWS
Sensational
Commodore
Offers
We've five fantastic offers on Com¬
modore's micro pacesetters - for the home
or the home office. If you've been thinking
of a home computer - or an add-on for your
own Commodore - now's the time!
Spectrum’s specialist Home Computer
Centres are probably the UK's leading
Commodore dealers - and with offers like
these, it's not hard to see why!
We've an extra special bonus, too -take
the coupon to your Spectrum dealer for a
full 50p off a host of top software titles for
the Commodore CBM64, SX-64 and VIC-
20 .
So hurry, along to your local SPECTRUM
Home Computer Centre NOW - we re
nationwide so there's a store near you. With
savings like these you can’t afford to miss
out!
Now in stock!
Double your disc
capacity with the
OPUS
Dual Density
Disk
Interface Kit
for the
BBC Model ‘B’
Incredible value for money!
Commodore SX-64
Portable Package
OVER
€525
What a great deal for the small
business, or the executive on the
move! We've SLASHED THE PRICE of
this complete, ready-to-use package
featuring the incredible Commodore
SX-64 Portable Colour Computer. It
has a powerful 64K RAM memory, plus
a detachable, full-function keyboard
plus built-in disk drive AND colour
monitor.
Not only that - the package also
includes an MPS-801 dot matrix
Printer, plus 3 popular business
pro grams - Easy File, Easy Script word¬
processing and Easy Stock.
All this can be yours at a truly
amazing £525 off our normal list Price
- at Spectrum NOW!
Includes:
Commodore SX64 Portable
Computer
Plus!
MPS 801 Printer & 3 Popular
business programs Easy file, Easy
script & Easy stock.
Net all stores carry every advertised item, please phone before making a journey - prices correct at time of going to press fftOE
spectrum
CHARGE CARO
Up to £1000
Instant Credit
• There's up to £1,000 worth of Instant Credit
available on a Spectrum Chargecard. See your
local SPECTRUM dealer for written details (UK
mainland only) Typical APR -29.8%
Latest News
for up to date news, information & offers
from SPECTRUM - see PRESTEL page
600181 for details
250 PC W
Sensational
Commodore Deals
from Spectrum
CBM 64 Package
A superb home micro package, featuring the famous Commodore 64
computer with its powerful 64K RAM memory and full-colour graphics,
p'js • a C2N Data Recorder • 4 Commodore Games cassettes •
Quickshot 2 joystick SPECTRUM
SENSATIONAL PRICE
Commodore
MPS 802
Printer
Save Over £55
1541 Disk Drive Package
Add this top-value, high-quality Disk Drive to your Com
modore for huge fast-access mass data storage. This
fabulous package includes the Commodore 1541 Disk
Drive, plus • Introduction to Basic' and • Easy File'
software
SPECTRUM
SENSATIONAL
PRICE
Commodore
1520
Printer ^ /
Plotter
~*T
Save
Over £94
MPS801 Printer Package
Add-ons
1520 Col Print/Plotter.£99.95
MPS802 Printer.£345.00
C2N Data Recorder.£44.95
1701 Colour Monitor.£230.00
Simon’s Basic.£50.00
Intro to Basic Pt 1.£14.95
Intro to Basic Pt 2.£14.95
MPS801 Printer Ribbon.£9.95
MPS802 Printer Ribbn.£12.95
64 Magic Voice
Speech Synthesiser.£50.00
The best way yet to add a high-quality dot matrix
printer to your Commodore! Compatible 50 characters-
per-second printer with excellent graphics capability
- accepts tractor-feed paper. Plus • Easy script
word-processing software and • Games disk
SPECTRUM SENSATIONAL PRICE
Save
Over £105
VIC-20 Package
A superb Home Micro package with the pop
ular VIC-20 computer, plus • Commodore C-2N
Data Recorder • Original Commodore Games
Cassette
SPECTRUM
SENSATIONAL
PRICE
Computer
Dealers
Save
Over £50
SOFTWARE
MoneyOff
COUPON
Present this coupon to your SPECTRUM
dealer and we'll give you 50p OFF any software
for the Commodore 64 r VIC-20, or SX-64.
(Offer ends August 31 1984)
NAME.
ADDRESS.
TO THE DEALER: Redeem this coupon by stamping it with your Dealer
Stamp and returning it to the SPECTRUM GROUP PLC, Burrowfield,
Welwyn Garden City, Herts. PCW/Sept
or prospective dealers. If you would like to
know more about becoming a SPECTRUM
APPOINTED DEALER on an exclusive area
basis please write to Bob Cleaver.
Spectrum Group PLC. Hunting Gate
Hitchin. Herts SG4 0TJ Tel (0462) 37171
More from Spectrum
PC W 251
PROGRAM
SUPPLIER
MACHINE
PRICE
Tornado Low Level
Vortex
Spectrum
£5.95
Tales of the Arabian Knights
Interceptor
CBM 64
£7.00
Sabre Wolf
Ultimate
Spectrum
£9.95
Beach Head
Access
CBM 64
£9.95
Lords of Midnight
Beyond
Spectrum
£9.95
War of the Worlds
CRL
Spectrum
£5.95
Mugsy
FullThrottle
Melbourne House
Spectrum
£6.95
Micromega
Spectrum
£6.95
Trashman
Quicksilva
CBM 64
£7.95
World Cup
Artie
Spectrum
£6.95
Valhalla 64
Legend
CBM 64
£14.95
House of Usher
Anirog
Spectrum
£6.95
Psytron
Beyond
Spectrum
£7.95
Son of Blagger
Alligata
CBM 64
£7.95
Air Traffic Control
Microgen
Real Time
Spectrum
£9.95
3D Tank Duel
Spectrum
£5.95
Jack & the Beanstalk
Thor
Spectrum
£5.95
Jet Set Willy
Software Projects
Spectrum
£5.95
Kosmic Kanga
Micromania
Spectrum
£5.95
Encounter
Novagen
CBM 64
£9.95
Android 2
Ocean
CBM 64
£6.90
Titanic
R & R Software
Spectrum
£7.95
Match Point
Psion
Spectrum
£7.95
Hulk
Adventure International
CBM 64
£9.95
Fighter Pilot
Digital
Spectrum
£7.95
Worse Things Happen at Sea
Silversoft
Spectrum
£5.95
Factory Breakout
Star Trooper
Poppysoft
Melbourne House
Spectrum
CBM 64
£5.95
£6.95
Sheep in Space
Blue Thunder
Llamasoft
CBM 64
£7.50
Richard Wilcox
CBM 64
£6.95
Flight Path 737
Anirog
VIC 20
£7.95
Oracles Cave
Dorcas
CBM 64
£6.95
Football Manager
Addictive
CBM 64
£7.95
Micro Olympics
Micro User
BBC
£5.95
Beaky & the Eggsnatchers
Fantasy
CBM 64
£7.50
Gilligans Gold
Ocean
CBM 64
£6.90
Atic Atac
Ultimate
Spectrum
£5.50
Flight Path 737
Anirog
CBM 64
£7.95
Micro Olympics
Micro User
Spectrum
£5.95
Stock Car
Micro Power
BBC
£7.95
Cybertron Mission
Micro Power
CBM 64
£7.95
Stop the Express
Sinclair
Spectrum
£5.95
Aviator
Acornsoft
BBC
£14.95
Heathrow ATC
Hewson
CBM 64
£7.95
Automania
Microgen
Micro ' Twer
CBM 64
£7.95
Felix in the Factory
CBM 64
£7.95
Star Blitz
Softek
Spectrum
£6.95
Skull
Games Machine
CBM 64
£7.95
Code Name Mat
Am soft
Amstrad
£8.95
Hunter Killer
Am soft
Amstrad
£8.95
Amstrad Software all at €8.95
EDUCATIONAL
SOFTWARE
Wordhang
Happy Numbers
World Wise
Animal. Vegetable,Mineral
Happy Letters
Happy Writing
Time Man 1
Time Man 2
Map Rally
ARCADE GAMES
Home Runner
Harrier Attack
Sultans Maze
Spanner Man
Oh Mummy
Roland in Care
Roland on the ropes
Electron 22622
Gems of Stradus
Chess
Laser Wrap
Haunted Hedges
Codename Matt
Xanagrams
Hunter Killer
3-D Invaders
Alien Break-in
Atom smasher
Electro Freedy
Fire Blaster
Admiral Graf Spee
Star Commands
Crazy Golf
Punchy
BBC Model B
Package Offer
HURRY!
Offer extended
WHILE
STOCKS
LAST
Including FREE!
• BBC Cassette recorder
• 5 pieces of software
when you purchase a BBC B' from Spectrum.
The BBC MODEL B, probably the SPECTRUM PRICE
most flexible personal microcomputer
available today. Using powerful BBC
BASIC, the BBC B is widely accepted as
providing the educational standard for
computer learning.
The model B features a variety of
interface ports allowing easy connec¬
tion not just of ordinary peripherals but
also second processors or devices to
give access to teletext or prestel
services.
Opus Disk Drive For BBC ‘B’
Here’s the very latest in 5 V 4 " disk drives
for your BBC Micro.
The Opus 5401 is a single-sided 40
Track drive with direct-drive and microp¬
rocessor control. This reliable and advan¬
ced drive has our 1-Year guarantee.
Call in at your local Spectrum dealer
and ask for the product by name.
SPECTRUM
PRICE
Including: MANUAL & UTILITIES DISC.
Acorn Electron
The Electron gives high quality graphics out¬
put to either colour T V. or monitor. Sound
can be generated through the internal loud¬
speaker The Electron comes complete with a
free introductory cassette, containing 19 free
programmes and two manuals - the User
Guide and “Start programming with the
Electron".
SPECTRUM
PRICE
Not all stores carry every advertised item, please phone before making a journey - prices correct at time of going to press E60E
Up to £1000
Instant Credft
• There's up to £1,000 worth of Instant Credit
available on a Spectrum Chargecard. See your
local SPECTRUM dealer for written details (UK
mainland only) Typical APR -29.8%
252 PC W
Latest News
for up to date news, information & offers
from SPECTRUM - see PRESTEL page
600181 for details
Everything you've ever wanted for your
ZX Spectrum
DK’Tronics Keyboard
for ZX Spectrum
SPECTRUM PRICE
D'Ktronics Lightpen.£19.95
D'Ktronics Dualport Joystick Interface.£13.00
D'Ktronics Portable Joystick Interface.£22.95
Quickshot Mkll
Joystick
SPECTRUM
V AMPUFI
PECTRUM % Fort!
PRICE ZX SPECT
ir 5 19
1 ST0NECHIP ACCESSORIES
ECHO
AMPLIFIER
Programmable
Coming soon
SPECTRUM KEYBOARD
For the
ZX SPECTRUM
Joystick
Interface
WITH SOUND NO NEED
TO TAKE YOUR SPEC¬
TRUM APART
j £ 19 95
‘24*
£ 59 95
Alphacom 32 Printer
SPECTRUM PRICE
ALPHACOM 42 For Dragon, BBC,
Commodore, Atari (Interfaces extra) Paper Rolls for Alphacom Printers
SPECTRUM PRICE.£79.95 Box of 5 Rolls.£6.00
Digital Tracer
from RD labs
for the ZX
Spectrum
Cheetah
32K RAM
Pack £39.95
Kempston
Joystick
Interface £15
(Joysticks opt. extra)
CURRAH Speech Synthesiser. £29.95
DK’TRONICS Lightpen.£19.95
DK’TRONICS DUALPORT Joystick
Interface.£14.95
STACKLIGHT Rifle with
3 FREE GAMES.£27.50
Sinclair ZX INTERFACE 2
The new ROM Cartridge/Joystick interface.
Loads programs instantly! Takes two joysticks!
Just plug in and play. ONLY £19.95
Plus New ROM cartridge software.
ZX Spectrum
48K
Prism VTX
5000 Modem
NOW, YOUR ZX SPECTRUM IS YOUR
KEY TO THE WORLD with the
incredible PRISM
VTX 5000 MODEM
• Versatile modem for ZX Spectrum (16K or 48K) versions • Slim
design fits easily, matches your micro • Instant access to PresteT &
Micronet 800 information services • Instant communication with
other ZX Spectrum users •
SAVE £20
Spectrum Computer Centres have no connection whatsoever with the ZX Spectrum Comput
Computer
Dealers
or prospective dealers. If you would like to
know more about becoming a SPECTRUM
APPOINTED DEALER on an exclusive area
basis please write to: Bob Cleaver,
Spectrum Group PLC, Hunting Gate,
Hitchin, Herts SG4 0TJ Tel: (0462) 37171
More from Spectrum.
PC W 253
Atari 800XL
Monitors
Cumana
Disc Drives
Check with your local
Spectrum Dealer for
low-low prices
• Powerful 64K RAM • Full-stroke keyboard •
Full sound with 31/2 octave range #11 Graphic
Display modes • Full colour (256 Colours - 128
colours can be displayed at one time) Ask to see
this super new micro at your local SPECTRUM
dealer NOW!
Atari 600XL... £159.99
See your local Spectrum dealer for a wide range of
other Atari add-ons
Model 328
Spectravideo Cassette
Recorder.£39.95
SANYO 12” Green Monitor.£90.85
PHOENIX Amber.£126.50
FIDELITY CM14 Colour.£199.95
SANYO CDD 3125NB Colour
Monitor.£228.85
SANYO 14” Colour TV (ideal as a
monitor).£229.95
COMMODORE Model 1701.£230.00
MICROVITEC Cub.£452.00
FOR BBC
CS100E... £175.95
CS100... £194.35
CS200E.. . £224.25
CS200... £263.35
FOR DRAGON
DS250. . . . £284.05
DS500. ... £332.35
DS1000 . . £355.35
DD500 .. . £435.85
Adam
CBS Adam
Computer
Including High speed
data recorder & printer CBS Colecovision Games Console £99.99
Sensational
Printer Offers
from Spectrum
Quendata
Just look at this for value - a true daisy-wheel
printer offering top quality printing at a
remarkably low price. Print speed is 18/
20 cps, uni-or bi-directional printing (dep¬
ends on software), variable pitch
Memotech
MTX Series
MTX 512 64K RAM
Other Printer Bargains
SEIKOSHA
GP50A.£99.95
GP50S Spectrum.£99.95
GP500A.£179.95
GP550A.£229.00
GPI00A Mkll.£199.95
GP100VC VIC 20/64 .£199.95
Friction Feed GP100/250X.£28.75
SEIKOSHA INTERFACES & CABLES
RS232 Interface (for GP100A).£80.50
Dragon Cable/BBC Cable-each at £11.50
Standard Centronics Parallel Cable ... £23.00
EPSON
FX80.£503.70
FX80 - Tractor Feed.£36.80
RX80T.£286.35
RX80FT.£327.75
16 User definable Function Keys • 12 Key Numeric Pad
• Z80A at 4MHz • 24K ROM containing MTX BASIC •
MTX NODDY FRONT PANEL DISPAY • ASSEMBLER/
DISASSEMBLER Video Display Processor with 16K Memotech RS232 Communication Port.£60.00
video-RAM • 64K User RAM Twin RS232 Communica- SEPERATE EXPANSION ITEMS
tions Board ROM Expansions: Node Systems • MTX Silicon Disc (256K).£334.78
PASCAL • MTX FORTH Eight User Definable Virtual 80 Column Colour Board.£75.00
Screens • Up to 32 SPRITES MEMOTECH SOFTWARE
Also available: Backgammon (Cassettd).£8.95
MTX 500 32K RAM.£199 Chess (Cassette) .£9.95
FDX DISK DRIVE (Optional extra) from £399.00 Blobbo (Cassette).£6.95
Memotech 64K RAM Expansion.£85.00 Kilopede (Cassette).£6.95
Memotech 128K RAM Expansion.£160.00 Super Minefield (Cassette).£6.95
Oric Atmos
Spectravideo
Model 318
spectrum
CHARGE CAPO
Not all stores carry every advertised item, please phone before making a Journey - prices correct at time of going to press EftOE
Up to £1000
Instant Credit
• There's up to £1,000 worth of Instant Credit
available on a Spectrum Chargecard. See your
local SPECTRUM dealer for written details (UK
mainland only) Typical APR -29.8%
Latest News
for up to date news, information & offers
from SPECTRUM - see PRESTEL page
600181 for details
254 PC W
There’s a Spectrum near you...
AVON
BATH Software Plus, 12 York St
Tel: (0225) 61676
CLEVIDON Computer & Audio Centre, 12A
Old St Tel: (0272) 879514
WESTON-S-MARE K & K Computers.
32 Alfred St Tel: (0934)419324
DUNSTABLE Dormans 7-11 Broad Walk
Tel: (0582) 65515
UI6HT0N BUZZARO The Computer Ctr
at Milton Keynes Music, 17 Bridge St
Tel: (0525)376622
LUTON Terry-More, 49 George St
Tel: (0582) 23391/2
BERKSHIRE
BRACKNELL Computer Centre, 44 The
Broadway Tel: (0344) 427317
SL0U8H MU Games and Computers 245
High St Tel: (0753) 21594
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE
BLETCHLEY Rams Computer Centre,
117 Queensway. Tel: (0908) 647744
CHESHAM Reed Photography & Comp¬
uters, 113 High St Tel: (0494) 783373
CAMBRIDGESHIRE
CAMBRIDGE K P Computers Ltd. 19/20
Market St Tel: (0223) 312240
(Open 6 Oays)
HUNTINGDON T.S.C. Electronics, 3 All
Saints Passage. High St Tel: (0480)
411579
PETERBOROUGH Ptrbrgh Communications,
91 Midland Rd (0733) 41007
CHANNEL ISLANDS
GUERNSEY Gruts, 3-5 The Pollett
St Peter Port Tel: (0481) 24682
JERSEY Audio & Computer Centre.
7 Peter St St Helier. Tel: (0534) 74000
CHESHIRE
ALTRINCHAM Mr Micro 28 High St
Tel: (061) 941 6213
CREWE Microman Unit 2.
128 Nantwich Rd. Tel: (0270) 216014
ELLESMERE PORT RFR Computers, 1
Pool town Rd. Whitby Tel: 051 356 4150
MACCLESFIELD Camera & Computer Cen¬
tre 118 Mill St Tel: (0625) 27468
STOCKPORT Wilding Ltd.
1 Little Underbank Tel: (061) 480 3435
WARRINGTON Wildings, 111 Bridge St
Tel: (0925) 38290
WIDNES Computer City, 78 Victoria Road
Tel: (051) 420 3333
WILMSLOW Swift of Wilmslow, 4-6 St
Annes Parade. Tel: (0625) 526213
CLEVELAND
MIDDLESBOROUGH McKenna & Brown,
206 Lmthorpe Rd. Tel: (0642) 222368
CORNWALL
ST AUSTELL A B & C Computers, Duchy
House, 6 Lower Aylmer Sq.
Tel: (0726) 67337
TRURO Truro Micro Ltd., Unit 1, Bridge Ha.
New Bridge St Tel: (0872) 40043
CUMBRIA
BARROW-IN-FURNESS Barrow Computer
Centre. 2/4 The Mall. Tel: (0229) 38353
CARUSLE The Computer Shop, 56-58
Lowther St Tel: (0228) 27710
PENRITH Penrith Communications.
14 Castlegate. Tel: (0768) 67146
Open Mon-Fri till 8pm
WHITEHAVEN P D Hendren 15 King St
Tel: (0946) 2063
DERBYSHIRE
ALfRETON Gordon Harwood 69-71 High
St Tel: (0773) 832078
CHESTERFIELO The Computer Centre,
14 Stephenson Place Tel: (0246) 208802
DEVON
EXETER Seven Counties (Computers) Ltd., 7
Pans Street Tel: (0392) 211212
EXMOUTH Open Channel. 30 The Strand.
Tel: (0395) 264408
PLYMOUTH Syntax Ltd., 76 Cornwall
St Tel: (0752) 28705
TIVERTON Actron Micro Computers.
37 Bampton St Tel: (0884) 252854
TORQUAY Devon Computers. 8 Torhill Rd..
Castle Circus. Tel: (0803) 526303
DORSET
BOURNEMOUTH Lansdowne Computer Ctr
1 Lansdowne Crescent Tel: (0202) 20165
DURHAM
DARLINGTON McKenna & Brown.
102 Bondgate Tel: (0325) 459744
ESSEX
BASILOON Godfrey's 28-32 East Walk,
Tel (0268) 289379
BASILOON Godfrey's Computer Centre 5
Lamdon Mam Centre Lamdon. Tel: (0268)
416747
CHELMSFORD Maxton Hayman Ltd.,
5 Broomfield Rd. Tel: (0245) 354595
COLCHESTER Brainwave 51 Head St Tel:
(0206) 561513
GRAYS H Reynolds. 79 Orsett Rd.
Tel (0375) 5948
ILJORD Woodmans. 76 Ilford Lane.
Tel: (01) 478 1307
SOUTHEND Computer Centre 332 London
Rd. Tel: (0702) 337161
HAMPSHIRE
BASIN6ST0KE Fisher's, 2-3 Market
Place. Tel: (0256) 22079
PORTSMOUTH (Waterloovllle)G B
Microland, London Rd., (Opp. Co-op)
Tel: (07014) 59911
SOUTHAMPTON RJ Parker & Son Ltd.,
11 West End Rd.. Bitterne
Tel: (0703) 445926
SOUTHAMPTON LT.C. Ltd., 112 East St,
Tel: (0703) 333958/24703
WINCHESTER Winchester Camera &
Computer Centre. 75 Parchment St
Tel: (0962) 53982
HEREFORD
HEREFORD Melgray Hi-Tech Ltd.,
49 Broad St Tel: (0432) 275737
HERTFORDSHIRE
HITCHIN GK Photographic & Computers,
68A Hermitage Rd.. Tel: (0462) 59285
POTTERS BAR The Computer Shop.
197 High St Tel: (0707) 44417
ST ALBANS (Harts) Clarks Computer
Centre 14-16 Hollywell Hill.
Tel: (0727) 52991
STEVENAGE D J Computers, 11 Town
Square. Tel: (0438) 65501
WATFORD SRS Microsystems Ltd., 94 The
Parade, High St Tel: (0923) 26602
WELWYN GARDEN CITY D J Computers, 40
Fretherne Rd. Tel (07073) 28435/28444
HUMBERSIDE
BEVERLEY Computing World. 10 Swaby s
Yard Dyer Lane. Tel: (0482 881831
GRIMSBY RC Johnson Ltd.. 22 Friargate,
Riverhead Centre. Tel: (0472) 42031
HULL The Computer Centre,
26 Anlaby Rd. Tel: (0482) 26297
ISLE OF MAN
DOUGLAS T H Colebourn Ltd.,
57r61 Victoria St. Tel: (0624) 3482
ISLE OF WIGHT
COWES Beken & Son 15 Bath Rd. Tel:
(0983) 297181
KENT
BECKENHAM Supa Computers Ltd. 425
Croydon Rd., Tel: (01) 650 3569
BROAOSTAIRS Video Vision 19/20 Willow
Court, St Peters Park Road Tel: (0843)
63284 (No Early Closing Day)
BROMLEY Computers Today 31 Market
Square Tel: (01) 290 5652
CANTERBURY Ctbury Computer Centre 56/
57 Palace St Tel: (0227) 62101
DOVER Kent Photos & Computers, 4 King St
Tel: (0304) 202020
6RAVESEN0 Marshalls Computers &
Cameras. 3 Windmill St Tet (0474) 65930
RAINHAM Microway Computers Ltd, 39
High St Medway Towns.
Tel: (0634) 376702
SEVENOAKS Ernest Fielder Computers,
Dorset St Tel: (0732) 456800
SITTIN6B0URNE Computers Plus, 65 High
St Tel: (0795) 25677
TUNBRIDGE WELLS Modata Computers
Ltd 28-30 St Johns Rd. Tel: (0892)
41555
LANCASHIRE
ACCRIN6T0N PV Computers.
104 Abbey St Tel: (0254) 36521/32611
BLACKBURN Tempo Computers, 9 Railway
Rd Tel: (0254) 691333
BURNLEY I MO Computer Centre, 39/43
Standish St BB11 1AP Tel: (0282) 54299
PRESTON Wilding s, 49 Fishergate
Tel: (0772) 556250
LEICESTERSHIRE
MARKET HARB0R0U6H Harborough Home
Computers. 7 Church St
Tel (0858) 63056
LINCOLNSHIRE
UNCOLN MKD Computers. 24 Newlands.
Tel: (0522) 25907
LONDON
E0 Percivals, 85 High St North, East Ham
Tel: (01) 472 8941
El 7 Erol Computers Ltd, 125 High Street
Walthamstow Tel: (01) 520 7763
EC1 Pedro Computer Services Ltd.. 47
Clerkenwell Road Tel: (01) 251 8635
EC2 Devron Computer Centre. 155 Moorgate
Tel: (01) 638 3339/1830
N14 Logic Sales. 19 Broadway. The Bourne.
Southgate. Tel: (01) 882 4942
N20 Castlehurst Ltd 1291 High Rd
Tel: (01)446 2280
NW4 Da Vinci Computer Store, 112 Brent
St, Hendon Tel: (01) 202 2272
SE1 Vic Odden s 6 London Bridge Walk.
Tel: (01) 403 1988
SEO Square-Deal. 373-375 Footscray Rd.
New Eltham. Tel: (01) 859 1516
SE15 Castlehurst Ltd, 152 Rye Lane,
Peckham Tel: (01) 639 2205
SW5 CLM/Matmos 264 Earls Court Tel: (01)
373 458/6333
SW16 Buffer Micro Shop, 310 Streatham
High Rd Tel: (01) 769 2887
W1 Computers of Wigmore St. 87 Wigmore
St Tel: (01) 486 0373
W1 Sonic Foto & Micro Centre. 256
Tottenham Court Rd. Tel: (01) 580 5826
W7 TK Electronics, 11/13 Boston Rd.
Hanwell. Tel: (01) 579 2842
MANCHESTER
GREATER
BOLTON Wilding Ltd, 23 Deansgate
Tel: (0204) 33512
MANCHESTER Lomax Ltd.. 8 Exchange St
St Ann s Square. Tel: (061) 832 6167
OLDHAM Home & Business Computers Ltd.
54 Yorkshire St Tel: (061) 6331608
ROCHDALE Home & Business Computers.
75 Yorkshire St Tel: (0706) 344654
SWINTON Mr Micro Ltd., 69 Partington
Lane. Tel: (061) 728 2282
Late Night Friday
WIGAN Wilding Ltd, 11 Mesnes St
Tel: (0942) 44382
MERSEYSIDE
BIRKENHEAD Fairs Cameras & Hi-Fi. Dacre
Hill. Rock Ferry. Tel: (051) 645 5000
HESWALL Thornguard Computer Systems.
46 Pensby Rd. Tel: (051) 342 7516
HUTTON Ian Houghton 5 Huyton Hey Rd.
Tel: (051) 489 5785
LIVERPOOL Beaver Radio, 20-22 White¬
chapel. Tel: (051) 709 9898
LIVERPOOL (Alntran) Hargreaves. 31-37
Warbreck Moor Tel: (051) 525 1782
MIDDLESEX
HARROW Camera Arts. (Micro Computer
Division) 42 St Ann s Rd.
Tel: (01) 427 5469
TEDDIN6T0N Andrews, Broad St
Tel: (01) 977 4716
UXBRIDGE J K L Computers. 7 Windsor St
Tel: (0895) 51815
NORFOLK
FAKENHAM Fastview. 12 Norwich Rd.
Tel: (0328) 51319
THETFORD C B & Micros. 21 Guidhall St
Tel: (0842) 61645
NORTHAMPTONSHIRE
NORTHAMPTON Dormans. 22 Princes Walk
Grosvenor Centre. Tel: (0604) 37031
NOTTINGHAMSHIRE
NOTTINGHAM Jacobs Computers. 13
Middlegate Newark Tel: (0636) 72594
WORKSOP Computagrafix. 132 Bridge St
Tel: (0909) 472248
NORTHERN IRELAND
BELFAST Arthur Hobson Ltd, 37 Great Vic¬
toria St Tel: (0232) 246336
PORTSDOWN Pedlows. 16 Market St.
Craigavon County Armagh. Tel: (0762)
332265
LONDONDERRY Foyle Computer Systems.
3 Bishop St Tel: (0504) 268337
NEWRY Newry Computer Centre. 34
Monaghan St Tel: (0693) 66545
NORTHUMBERLAND
MORPETH Telerents 31 Newgate St Tel:
(0665) 513 537
OXFORDSHIRE
ABIN6D0N Ivor Fields Computers. 21 Stert
St Tel: (0235) 21207
BANBURY Computer Plus, 2 Church Lane.
Tel: (0295) 55890
OXFORD Ivor Fields. 7 St Ebbes St
Tel: (0865) 247082
SCOTLAND
ABERDEEN North East Computers. 1-3 Ellis
St. Peterhead Tel: (0779) 79900
AYR Vennals, 6A New Bridge St
Tel (0292) 264124
DUMFRIES Vennals. 71 English St
Tel (0387) 54547
EDINBURGH The Silicon Centre,
6-7 Antigua St Tel: (031) 557 4546
6LAS60W Victor Morris Ltd. 340 Argyle St
Tel: (041) 221 8958
HAMILTON Tom Dickson Computers, 8-12
Cadzow St Tel: (0698) 283193
STORNOWAY Cameron's Computers The
Playhouse. Tel: (0851) 3427
SHROPSHIRE
SHREWSBURY Computerama,
13 Castlegate Tel: (0743) 60528
TELFORD Computer Village. 4 Hazeldine Ho.
Telford Town Ctr. Tel: (0952) 506771
SOMERSET
TAUNTON Grays, 1 St James St
Tel: (0823) 72986
STAFFORDSHIRE
STAFFORD Computerama, 59 Forgate St
Tel: (0785) 41899
STOKE-ON-TRENT Computerama, 11 Mkt
Square Arcade Hanley. (0782) 268620
STOKE-ON-TRENT The Microchip, 37 Sta¬
tion Rd Biddulph Tel: (0782) 511559
SUFFOLK
BURY ST EDMUNDS Guildhall Cptr Ctr. 11
Guildhall St Tel: (0284) 705772
IPSWICH Brainwave. 24 Crown St
Tel: (0473) 50965
LOWESTOFT John Wells. 44 London Rd
North Tel (0502 3742
SURREY
CAMBERLEY Camera Arts (Micro Computer
Division). 36 High St Tel: (0276) 65848
CHERTSEY Chertsey Computer Centre, 1
Windsor St Tel: (09328) 64663
EPSOM The Micro Workshop. 12 Station
Approach Tel: (03727) 21533
HASLEMERE Haslemere Computers, 25
Junction PI. (Adj. Rex Cinema)
Tel: (0428) 54428
RICHMOND Crest Computer Services, 8 Hill
St Tel: (01) 940 8635
WALLIN6T0N Surrey Micro Systems Ltd.
53 Woodcote Rd. Tel: (01) 647 5636
WOKING Harpers, 71-73 Commercial Way
Tel: (04862) 25657
SUSSEX
BEXHILL-ON-SEA Computerware. 22 St
Leonards Rd. Tel: (0424) 223340
CRAWLEY Gatwick Computer Services, 62
Boulevard Tel (0293) 37842
UTTLEHAMPTON Alan Chase Ltd. 39 High
St Tel (09064) 5674
ABERDARE Inkey Computer Services Ltd,
70 Mill St The Square Trecynon.
Tel (0685) 881828
ABERYSTWYTH AberData at Galloways, 23
Pier St. Tel: (0970) 615522
CARDIFF Randall Cox, 18-22 High St
Arcade Tel: (0222) 31960
LLANDUDNO (Gwynedd) Computer Plus
Discount 15 Clomnel St Tel (0492) 79943
NEWPORT (6wnnt) Randall Cox. 118
Commercial St Tel: (0633) 67378
PEMBROKE Randall Cox, 19 Main St
Tel (064) 682876
WREXHAM T E Roberts, 26 King St
Tel: (0978) 364404/364527
WARWICKSHIRE
NUNEATON Micro City 1A Queens Road Tel:
(0203) 382049
RU6BY The Rugby Micro Centre. 9-11
Regent St Tel: (0788) 70522
WEST MIDLANDS
COVENTRY Greens, 22 Market Way
Tel: (0203) 28342
DUDLEY Central Computers, 35 Church Hill
Precinct Tel: (0384) 238169
WALSALL New Horizon Computer Centres. 1
Goodall St Tel: (0922) 24821
WEST BROMWICH Bell & Jones. 39 Queens
Square. Tel: (021) 553 0820
WORCESTER
KIDDERMINSTER Central Computers. 20-
21 Blackwell St Tel: (0562) 746941
WORCESTER David Waring Ltd, 1 Marmion
House High St Tel: (0905) 27551
YORKSHIRE
BRADFORO Erricks, Fotosomc House Raw-
son Square. Tel: (0274) 309266
DEWSBURY Home & Business Computers.
59 Daisy HilL Tel: (0924) 455300
DONCASTER The Soft Centre
8 Queensgate Waterdale Centre Tel:
(0302) 20088
HUDOERSFIELO Richards (Formerly
Lauries) 12 Queen St Tel: (0484) 25334
HULL Computer Centre 26 Anlaby Rd. Tel:
(0482) 26297
LEEDS Bass & Bligh. 4 Lower Briggate.
Tel: (0532) 454451
YORK York Computer Centre 7 Stonegate
Arcade Tel: (0904) 641862
PC W 255
The new Electron from Acorn.
Ask any child at school why
it’s worth £199.
A gentle teacher.
The Electron plugs straight into virtually
any TV set and cassette player so you will be
MostBritishchildren have one thing in common the Electron is such an exceptional machine
with the new Electron microcomputer: they speak at the price.
The Electron is neat and compact. Yet i
_ is last and powerful.(Full details,
for the technically minded.
\ are in the box opposite.)
It produces high
quality sound using its
own internal speaker.
And it offers a range
the same language.
'lou see,the Electron is the first
micro remotely in this price range to a
use BBC Basic, the computer f
language that is rapidly becoming
the standard in British schools.
But that's not all. Most
children will feel at home with
the Electron as soon as they lay
hands on it.
This is because it has
developed out of the Micro that
has been chosen by over 80% of
schools participating in the
Governments current Micros In
Schools project. It has a similar
keyboard and has most of the
functions of this much acclaimed
(but naturally, more expensive) machine.
So now children will be able to continue their
computer studies at home. They’ll be able to use the
same educational programs they use at school. And,
if asked nicely, they'll he able to help willing adults
take their first steps into computing.
All this for only £199.
A micro technolo g y break-through.
And now a few
> I use BBC Basic
The leading
computer
language in
schools
of facilities manv larger
J c?
reasons
for adults why MCW VOU'VE MASTERED MONSTERS,
tor adults why | ^ C0U L P uov£ ON TO
more expensive machines
just cannot match.
For example the Electrons
colour graphics have the highest
resolution of any home computer.
This is because the chip that
controls the graphics, specially
designed bv Acorn, is one of the
most advanced of its kind. As a result,
the Electron delivers twice as manv characters across
the screen as its closest competitor.
Built to last and to grow.
The Electron has been designed and built to be
a permanent part of the family,year in year out.
Particular care has been paid to the keyboard.
It is electric typewriter style:robustly constructed
with a good, solid ‘feel* It has a space bar,and single
entry keys for key commancEr —
In other words it’s comfortable and
easy to use,avoiding the need for the
manual gymnastics sometimes associated with
calculator style keyboards.
And it w ill grow with you via expansion
modules, that Acorn are developing, to take peri¬
pheral additions such as printers and disc drives.
So as your know ledge, interest and ambitions
develop, the Electron can develop with you.
Additionally, to give you all the support
you’ll need to generate your own applications
software, we’ve established a phone-in service
attended by specialists to give advice,encourage¬
ment and practical help.
ready to go as soon as you get it home. Money Management” through “Starship Command”
It comes not only with a comprehensive user to “Creative Graphics” (which, incidentally, includes
guide,whieh describes the machine and its functions, some spectacular three-dimensional rotating shapes),
but also with a book that takes you step by step Naturally, with its strong educational links.
EXPERTS LIKE WHAT MICRO?'
AMD ME RATE THE ELECTRON
HIGHER THAW ANN OT- THE
-1 COMPETITION).
through the basic principles
nrofframming.
A free taste
of its versatility .
You will also receive
an “Introductory” cassette which
will put the Klectron through
its paces showing you a
little of what it can do
with its 64k of memory
(32k ROM, 32k RAM).
The cassette will
give you a taste of
exceptional
graphics we men-
earlier;of its ability
to play and notate music, and
you how it might help in
accounting. It will challenge you
to a few games and will, if you ask it, do your whole
family’s biorhythms in a matter of seconds.
You will in short, through the 15 separate
programs it contains, get a glimpse of the Electrons
potential. But only a glimpse, for that potential is as
limitless as your own interest and imagination.
A widening range of software.
To help you realise some of that potential,
Electron software already ranges from “Personal
educational software will be extremely
important for the Electron and even now O and
A Level revision papers are being processed for
Electron users.
How to get vour Electron.
The Acorn Electron can be found at local
Acorn dealers and major high street stores. However,
if you would like to order one with your credit card,
or if you would like the address of your nearest
supplier, just phone 01-200 0200.
Hardware.
2M Hz 6502.
32K ROM 32K RAM (64k total).
High resolution graphics 640 x 256 max.
Seven display modes.
8 colours and 8 flashing colours.
1200 baud CUTS tape interface with motor control.
Expansion bus for add-on interface modules.
Internal loudspeaker.
PAL UHF output to colour or black and w hite domestic TV.
RGB output for colour monitor.
56 key full travel QWERTY keyboard with spacebar.
Technical Specifications
Software.
BBC BASIC.
Extensions include interger, floating point and string variables, multi dimen¬
sional arrays: IF.. .THEN... ELSE,REPEAT... UNTIL.procedures with
local variables.
Operating system allows plot, draw and fill commands.
Event timing.
Built-in assembler.
6502 assembly language can be mixed with BASIC.
The Acorn j Electron.
A HIGH RESOLUTION MONITOR
FOR THE SINCLAIR QL
AT A LOWIY £299.95 (INC.VAT).
This is the much acclaimed JVC colour
monitor from Opus.
And it gives Sinclair QL owners a lot more than
just excellent high resolution.
As you know, the QL gives out information
in 85 characters on the screen instead of the standard
80 characters.
And the loss of those five characters means
that ordinary monitors simply can’t show you the
whole picture.
Opus, however, have overcome this problem
by adapting the JVC, via a special interface and cable,
so that the QL can now work 100% efficiently
on it.
All for the lowly price of just £ 299-95 includ¬
ing VAT, carriage and, of course, a year’s hill guarantee.
You can order it by post by filling in the
coupon below and sending it to: Opus Supplies Ltd.,
158 Camberwell Road, London SE5 OEE. (You’ll
receive it within ten days by courier sendee.) Or you
can telephone 01-7018668 and pay by credit card.
Alternatively, you can buy at our showroom
between 9-00 -6.00pm Monday to Friday,
or 9-00 - 1.30pm Saturday.
MODEL REFERENCE
1302-2 High Resolution
RESOLUTION
580 x 470 Pixels
CRT.
14"
SUPPLY
220/240v. 50 60Hz.
E.H.T.
Minimum 19.5kv Maximum 22.5kv
VIDEO BAND WIDTH
10MHz.
DISPLAY
85 characters by 25 lines
SLOT PITCH
0.41mm
INPUT: VIDEO
R G B. Analogue TTL Input
SYNC
Separate Sync on R.G.B. Positive or Negative
EXTERNAL CONTROLS
On off switch and brightness control
To: Opus Supplies Ltd., 158 Camberwell Road, London SE5 OEE. Name.
Please send me:
_High Resolution Colour Monitor(s) at
£299.95 each (inc. VAT). _
I enclose a cheque for £ _Or please debit my credit card
account with the amount of£_My Access/Barclaycard
(please tick) no. is-
Telephone
Opus Supplies Ltd.
JUDGE FOR YOURSELF
; A
•n* jV
<"4^ '>
We ve taken the nsk factor out of buying software 1
So much so that we are prepared to refund you the full
purchase price on any of our Apple software products
within 21 days ol purchase il you re not satisfied with it'
At present our range includes
Invoicer
This will print invoices and generate information
which can also be used by our Bookkeeper package
Invoicer will use standard pre printed forms but we also
include a small utility program which will pre-print
forms’ on blank paper Invoicer will hold a price list
and customer list in memory (making for very fast
operation with a core of fast-moving lines and good
customers) Much larger lists can also be held on disc
Items and customers not on existing lists can easily be
entered via the keyboard
Bookkeeper
An essential package lor bookkeeping exercises
1 e Sales Day Book with analysis by category list of
debtors with dates etc, Purchase Day Book with
analysis Cash Book, Petty Cash Book, home accounts
etc Bookkeeper takes care of VAT calculations and
allows you to produce analysed and selected figures as
and when required le management figures, etc
Access
A superb Apple II»/He database manager (DBM)
Access has all the power and versatility you would
expect in an Apple DBM. regardless of price It is also
very fast for instance it will find an indexed item in
approximately 3 seconds and will retrieve a record
with complex sets of cnteria. such as AND. wildcard
range search, in less than 23 seconds This package
was previously available for £199 95 including VAT and
even at that pnce users found it to be good value for
money
Payroll
This package takes care ol Payroll calculations
and record keeping for the smaller business and will
handle all levels of pay tax codes (including NT No
Tax) and National Insurance at standard, reduced
over'pension age or nil rates, contracted out or not
Payroll works with batches of 50 employees at a time
and is being used successfully by companies with up
to 100 employees as well as larger organisations for
confidential processing Only information which has
changed since the last Payroll run need be entered
employee tax and National Insurance details are
stored The Inland Revenue specifications are followed
accurately no error ol calculation has ever been
reported since the hist version ol Payroll was tested in
1980 Users have found that Payroll is very easy to use
with very little knowledge of computers or payroll
procedures necessary lor successful operation In
addition to all usual calculations Payroll will compute
gross pay and deductions foi a given net pay
SSP (Statutory Sick Pay)
A free-standing program that will compute
Statutory Sick Pay as required by law It will compute
SSP for all cases including the most complex It is not
necessary to understand about the linking of periods of
incapacity for work reasons for exclusion from SSP etc
All information required by law and by you is printed
out at the end of each calculation Only information
which is actually needed must be entered for example
it is not necessary to enter pay details for someone
earning £80 per week plus overtime (the average pay is
obviously above the £65 threshold) SSP is so easy to use
that it is suitable lor training stall or even lor unusual
cases such as a pregnant employee who has been with
the company for less than 3 months and falls sick while
in custody outside the EEC 1 This is another of our highly
successful packages where no errors have been
reported
All our software packages are priced at £75 00
each plus VAT
You've got nothing to lose so why not see youi
local dealer or contact us NOW for your 21 day trial
packages II you would like further information ask lor
our Apple product sheet
Hilderbay
Professional Software
Dept MD8,
8-10 Parkway Regents Park. London NW1 7AA
Tel 01-485 1059 Telex 22870
BBC Micro Computer System
ALL PRICES
EXCLUDE VAT
Please add carriage
50p unless indicated
as follows:
(a) £8.00 (b) £2.50
(c) £1.50 (d) £1.00
ACORN COMPUTER SYSTEMS
BBC Model B.£320.00a
BBC Model B + Econet.C389.00a
BBC Model B + DFS.£400.00a
BBC Model B + DFS + Esconet £450.00a
6502 2nd Processor.£175.00b
Acorn Electron.£169.00b
Acorn Z80 2nd Processor.£264.00a
BBC Teletext Receiver.£195.00a
UPGRADE KITS
A to B Upgrade Kit.£75.00d
DFS Kit £95.00d.Installation £15.00
Econet Kit £55.00d.Installation £25.00
Speech Kit £47.00d.Installation £10.00
BBC FIRMWARE
1.2 Operating System.£7.50a
Basic II Rom.£22.00d
View Word Processor Rom.£52.00c
Wordwise W/P Rom.£34.00c
BCPL ROM + Disc.£87.00b
Disc Doctor Utility Rom.£28.00d
Termi Emulator Rom.£28.00d
ULTRACALC Rom (BBC Publications)
£69.00c
Gremlin debug Rom.£28.00d
Computer Concepts Graphics Rom
£28.00d
EXMON.£20.00d
TOOL KIT.£20.00d
Printmaster Rom (FX80).£28.00d
Communicator Rom.£59.00c
COMMSTAR.£29.00b
BBC COMPATIBLE 5.25" DISC DRIVES:
(All include cables, manual + format disc)
100K (40 Track) Teac.£120.00a
100K (40 Track) with psu Tec.£135.00a
200K (40 80 Track)) Teac.£155.00a
200K (80 Track) with psu Tec.£175.00a
400K (40 80 Track) Teac.£190.00a
400K (80TDS) with psu Mitsubishi£200.00a
2 x 100K (40 Track) with psu Teac
£300.00a
2 x 200K (40-80 Track) with psu Teac
£390.00a
2 x 400 (80) Track DS) with psu 40 80
£420.00a
3" Hitachi 100K Drive.£150.00c
Accessories:
Single Disc Cable.£6.00d
Double Disc Cable.£8.50d
3M DISCS with Lifetime Warranty
40T SS/SD.Pkt of 10.£16.00c
40T DS/DD.Pkt of 10.£22.00c
80T SS/DD.Pkt of 10.£26.00c
80T DS/DD.Pkt of 10.£30.00c
3" Double Sided Disc.Each £4.50c
FLOPPICLENE Drive Head Cleaning Kit
£14.50c
Disc Library Case.£1.90d
Disc File Case 30/40.£8.00c
Disc Lockable Case 30/40.£15.00c
Disc Lockable Case 60/70.£27.00b
PRINTERS & PLOTTERS
EPSON FX-80.
EPSON RX-80 FT.
EPSON FX-100.
EPSON DX-100.
Printer Sharer + Cable Set.
JUKI 6100 Daisy wheel.
BROTHER HR15.
Accessories:
Parallel or Serial Printer Lead ...
Serial Printer Lead.
Epson Serial Interface2K8148..
Epson Serial Interface 8143.
FX80 Dust Cover.
Epson Paper Roll Holder.
FX-80 Tractor Attachment.
PAPER Fanfold 2000 sheets ....
Ribbon MX80/RX80/FX80.
Ribbon MX/RX/FX100.
Juki Ribbon.
Gemini Delta 10.
Grafpad Graphics Tablet.
£325.00a
£240.00a
£480.00a
. £375 00a
£88.00c
£350.00a
£350.00a
£8.00d
£8.00d
£50.00c
£35.00c
£4.00d
£17.00c
E37.00C
...£13.50b
.£6.50c
...£12.50c
£3.00c
. £300.00a
£125.00c
CASSETTE RECORDERS
SANYO DR101 Data Recorder.£30.00b
Datex Slim Line.£20.00c
BBC Tape Recorder.£28.50b
Cassette Lead.£3.00d
Computer Grade C-12 cassette.£0.45d
Computer Grade Cassette 10 off.£4.00c
Phillips Mini-data cassette.. £3.00d
‘TIME-WARP’
BBC REAL-TIME-CLOCK/CALENDAR
A low cost unit that opens up the total range of Real-Time
applications. With its full battery backup, possibilities
include an Electronic Diary automatic document dating
precise timing & control in scientific applications, re¬
creational use in games. Its uses are endless and are
simply limited by one's imagination. Simply plugs into the
user port — no specialist installation required — No ROMS.
Supplied with extensive applications software.£29.00
U.V. ERASERS
UV1T Eraser with a built-in timer and mains indicator. Built-in
safety interlock to avoid accidental exposure to the harmful UV
rays. It can handle up to 5 Eproms at a time with an average
erasing time of about 20 mins.£59 + £2 p&p
UV1 as above but without the timer.£47 + £2 p&p
UV140 up to 14 Eproms.£61
UV141 as above but with timer.£79
BOOKS
We have a large selection of books on the BBC and other
titles. Please ask for details. No VAT on books.
SMARTMOUTH FOR THE BBC
The original Infinite speech'. Still the best.
A ready built totally self contained speech sythesiser unit,
attractively packaged with built-in speaker, AUX output
socket etc — no installation problems! It allows the
creation of any English word, with both ease and
simplicity, while, at the same time being very economical
in memory usage. You can easily add speech to most
existing programs. Due to its remarkable infinite vocabul¬
ary, its uses spread throughout the whole spectrum of
computer applications — these include industrial, com¬
mercial, educational, scientific, recreational etc. No
specialist installation — no need to open your computer,
simply plugs into the user port — and due to the simple
software, no ROMS are needed. SMARTMOUTH is
supplied with demo and developed prog ams on casset¬
te, and full software instructions.£37 + £2.50 carriage
TORCH Z80 DISC PACK
The proven upgrade for the BBC Micro. Comprising 2 x 400Kdisc
drive, Z80 processor with 64K of memory, and a CP/M compatible
operating system. The system is supplied complete with the
PERFECT software range including PERFECT WRITER,
PERFECT SPELLER, PERFECT CALC, and PERFECT FILE.
Full TORCHNET software is also supplied allowing sophisticated
networking between other unitsand Z80 basic.Disc Pack £699<a).
CONNECTOR
SYSTEMS
GRADUATE
IBM PC Compatible Upgrade for BBC B
Ask for delivery date
The TORCH Z80 SECOND PROCESSOR CARD—for those who
already have suitable disc drives. The card is supplied with all the
free perfect software and Z80 basic, as detailed above, presenting
a very attractive package. £299.
TORCH UNICORN
Designed with a total expansion capability
The Torch upgrade will give you a sophisticated business/
professional system. However it doesn't stop there — it gives you
the potential to expand — an expansion that no other current
system can offer. Why not contact us for your requirements?
EPROMER II
for the BBC
Our current version of the highly popular Eprom
programmer is now being enhanced to provide
more and better facilities for easy programming
by the user. The software will maintain its
superiority over all currently available similar
programmers. The range of eproms handled has
been widened, to include the eproms with lower
programming votage and eproms which can be
programmed using algorithm. Control of all
operations has been moved to the keyboard. The
screen display has been improved to give more
information. The screen editing facilities have
also been modified to simplify the data entry.
Please phone for further details
MONITORS
COLOUR GREEN MONITORS (leads incid)
Microvitec 1431 14" RGB Std Res £195.00a
Microvitec 1431 14" RGB/PAL + sound . £225.00a
Microvitec 1451 14" RGB Med Res £295.00a
Microvitec 1441 14" RGB Hi Res £420.00a
Microvitec 2031 14" RGB Std Res £287.00a
KAGA Vision II Hi Res £260.00a
KAGA Vision III 12" RGB Super Hi Res £358.00a
KAGA 12" Green Hi Res £106.00a
SANYO DM8112CX 12" Green Hi Res £99.00a
KAGA RGB Lead £6.50d
BNC Green Screen Monitor Lead £3.00d
Heavy duty monitor plinth for BBC £13.50b
Two tier metal plinth £19.50b
Microvitec plinth. £8.50b
Swivel base for Kaya Green. £19.50b
ACORN IEEE INTERFACE
A full implementation of the IEEE-488 standard, providing
computer control of compatible scientific & technical equip¬
ment, at a lower price than other systems Typical
applications are in experimental work in academic and
industnal laboratories the interface can support a network
of up to 14 other compatible devices, and *
several items o'
optimum <
£282
uuouiai lauuiaiunoo i nnoiiaLb uan supyun d HWIWUIK
up to 14 other compatible devices, and would typically link
iveral items of test equipment allowing them to run with the
)timum of efficiency. The IEEE Filing System ROM is
ipplied.£282
I D CONNECTORS
(Speed Block Type)
St. Pin Recep Edge
tacles Conn.
10 way 90p 85p 120p
20 way 145p 125p 195p
26 way 175p 150p 240p
34 way 200p 160p 320p
40 way 220p 190p 340p
50 way 235p 200p 390p
JUMPER LEADS
24 Ribbon Cable with Headers
14pin 16pm 24pin 40pm
Single
End 145p 165p 240p 380p
Double
End 210p 230p 345p 540p
Ribbon Cable with Sockets
20pin 26pin 34pin 40pin
lend 160p 200p 280p 300p
2 ends 290p 370p 480p 525p
D CONNECTORS
MALE No of Ways
Solder 80p 105p 160p 2S0p
Angled 150p 210p 2SOp 365p
FEMALE
Solder 105p 160p 200p 355p
Angled 165p 215p 290p 440p
Hoods 90p 85p 90p lOOp
IDC 15 way Plug 340p Socket 400p
I DC 25 way plug 385p Socket 450p
14 pin 375p 16 pin 400p
40 pin £10.30
TEXTOOL ZIF SOCKETS
RS 232 CONNS
(25 way D)
24"Singleend Male
24’ Single end Female
24" Female-Female
24 Male Male
24" Male-Female
£5
£5-25
£10
£9.50
£9.50
DIP HEADERS
14 pin
16 pin
24 pin
40 pin
Solder
Type
40 p
50p
lOOp
200 p
IDC
Type
120 p
140p
200 p
225p
AMPHENOL CONNECTORS
36 way plug Centronics
Solder £5.25 IDC £5.25
36 way socket Centronics
Solder £5.50 IDC £5.50
24 way plug IEEE
Solder £5.00 IDC £4.75
24 way socket IEEE
Solder £5.00 IDC £4.75
PCB Mtg Skt Ang pin
24 way £6.00 36 way £6.50
1 1
EUROCONNECTORS
DtN 41617
PLUG
SKT
21 way
160p
165p
31 way
170p
170p
DIN 41612
2 x 32 way St Pin
230p
275p
2 x 32 way Ang Pin
3 x 32 way St Pin
275p
320p
260p
300p
3 x 32 way Ang Pin
1 DC Skt A + B
375p
400p
275p
A + C
For 2 x 32 way please
(A + B. A + C)
specify spacing
J
RIBBON CABLE
(Grey/meter)
10 way
16 way
20 way
26 way
34 way
40 way
J 50 way
1 64 way
40p
60p
8Sp
120p
160p
180p
200p
280p
EDGE CONNECTORS
2x6 way
(Commodore)
2x10 way
(Commodore)
2x12 way
(Vic 20)
2x18 way
2 x 23 way
(ZX81)
2 x 25 way
2 x 28 way
(Spectrum)
2 x 36 way
1 x 43 way
2 x 22 way
2 x 43 way
1 x 77 way
2 x 50 way
(SlOOconn)
— 300p
150p -
— 350p
— 140p
175p 220p
225p 220p
200 p —
250p —
260p —
190p —
395p —
400p 50Op
600p —
COMPONENTS
2532
350p
1802CE
650p
TMS1601
£12
6875
750p
2732
350p
2650A
£12
TMS9980
£12
8205
225p
2764-25
500p
6502
400p
TMS9995
£12
8212
£11
27128-3
£15.00
6502A
650p
WD55
£14.50
8216
300p
4164-2
450p
6800
290p
Z80
300p
8224
300p
6802
300p
Z80A
400p
8250
£18
DIL SWITCHES
6809
cqaqc
650p
n o
Z80B
9.50
8251A
8255AC-5
£18
£19
4 way
70p
Douyt
68B09
LIZ
£12
| SUPPORT DEVICES |
8256
£36
6 way
lOOp
68B09E
£16
2651
£12
8279
£11
8 way
130p
68000-L8
£48
6520
300p
8288D
£11
10 way
1 50p
8035
£12
6522
400p
Z80P10
300p
8039
£12
6532
650p
Z80AP10
350p
1 BAUD RATE GENERATORS 1
8080A
450p
6551A
650p
Z80CTC
300p
8085A
£18
6821
200p
Z80ACTC
350p
MCI 4411
900p
8086
£22
68B21
250p
Z80DART
700p
COM8116
800p
8088
£22
6854
850p
Z80ADART
850p
4702B
750p
8748
£40
68B54
£12
Z80ACTC
350p
Z80AS10-0/2/9
900d
TMS9901
500p|
TMS9903
£25l
TMS9911
£18|
TMS9914
£14 001
| Z80AS10-0/1 /2/9 900p|
1 CRT CONTROLLER 1
CRT6545
900p
CRT5027
£18
CRT5037
£18
EF9365
£36
EF9366
£36
MC6845
650p
MC6847
650p
TMS9927
£18
TMS9928
£20
TMS9929
£16
MC6845SP
750p
1 SFF96364
800P
Tkoiinomatk: Ltd
MAIL ORDERS TO: 17 BURNLEY ROAD, LONDON NWI0 1ED
SHOPS AT: 17 BURNLEY ROAD, LONDON NW10
(Tel: 01-208 1177 (4 lines) Telex: 922800)
305 EDGWARE ROAD, LONDON W2
PLEASE ADD 50p p&p & 15% VAT'’
(K.xport: no VAT. p&p al CosO
Orders from Government Depts & C olleges etc welcome
Detailed Price I ist on request [ 1
Stock Hems are normally by return ol post
260 PC W
IBM
IBM PC 64K 2 OS Drives + Mono + Print AD ‘DOS £1950
IBM PC 64K 2 DS Drives + Colour - Print AD + DOS £2195
IBM XT 128K DS Drive + Print AD +DOS £3699
IBM XT 128KDS Drive + Colour + Print AD *DOS C3995
IBM Portable CCALL
APRICOT
FI. Xi/Pomt 7/Point 32
Free with all Apricots. Superwriter . Supercalc. Superplaner.
Comms. CPM86. ConcurantCPM86 MSDOS
Please rma for the BEST Apricot and Sirius DEALS that you
ever heard
MACINTOSH
MS Basic +■ Macwriter + Macpamt £1699
APPLE HE £490
APPLE IIC £799
SANYO
SANYO 550 with £750 worth software £650
SANYO 555 with £ 1000 worth software £849
COMPAQ
COMPAQ 256K RAM 2 Drives * MSDOS £1850
COMPAQ 256K RAM 10MB Hard Disk * Drive £3795
TELEVIDEO TELE-PC 1605128K. Double Disk. Mono £1995
CHAME LEON 9" Screen. Twin Onves. £ 1500 worth software
£1995
OLIVETTI M24 128K Double Drives £1850
OLIVETTI M24 128K. 10MB Hard Disk £3595
EPSON QX10192K RAM. DuaIDD Free Software £1495
EPSON PX-8 64K. CPM. Basic. Wordstar Cardbox Comms.
etc £699
HYPERION 256K. Ram disk. 2 drives, tree software £1995
KAYPRO 2 Double disk drives. lots of software £950
KAYPRO 4 Twin double sided drives and software £1355
KAYPRO 10 with 10Mb HD and Free software £1995
HEWLETT PACKARD HP 150 £2395
NEC APC Mono. Dual drive. 128K 2Mb8" disks £1890
NEC APC (Same as above but colour) C2295
NEC PC-8800 Monitor printer CPM. 5" Drives £995
NEC PC-8000 Colour printer 2 Drives CPM £995
(Please nno for the best NEC Deals)
MULTI USER COMPUTERS
NORTHSTAR Dimension 15MB HD 2 User with 128K £4995
HOBBY MICROCOMPUTERS
SPECTRUM48K
SINCLAIR QL
BBC MODELB
COMMODORE 64
ACORN ELECTRON
ATMOS
ATARI
PRINTERS
DOTMATRIX
Sale Price RRP
Canon PW1080A(NLQ)
Canon PW1156A(NLO)
Canon PJ1080A (Ink Jet)
Kaga Taxan KP810(NLQ)
KagaTaxan KP910 (NLO)
Epson RX80T
Epson RX80FT
Epson FX80
Epson RX100FT
Epson MX100FT
EpsonFX100FT
Epson LQ1500
ShinwaCTI-CP80
Shmwa 40 (Colour)
Prism SOS
Prism 132S (Colour)
Microprism FT (S&P)
Mannesmann Tally MT80
Mannesmann Tally MT160
Mannesmann Tally MT180
MT Pixy Plotter
Seikosha GP700A (Colour)
Seikosha GP250X
Seikosha GP550A
SeikishaGPIOOA
TEC 1550 (Parallel)
TEC 1550 (Serial)
Microlme 82A
Microlme 92P
Microlme 93P
Microlme 83P
Microlme 84P
Microlme 2410P
Microlme Tractors
STAR GemmilOX FT(120CPS)
STAR Delta 10FT (80C0L 160CPS)
STAR RadixIOFT (80C0L 200CPS)
Toshiba (192CPS 100CPS)
Texas Instruments Tl 810
Texas Instruments Tl 855FT
Anadex DP9725(240CPS)
Anadex WP6000 I330CPS)
Anadex DP6500(5000CPSl
DRE-Newbury ORI8820
DRE-NewburyDRl8931
Hermes 612B
Anadex DP9500(180CPS)
Anadex DP9620 (240CPSI
Siemens Ink Jet
Diablo colour ink iet
PRINTERS
DAISYWHEEL
Sale Price RRP
Brother EP22
Brother EP44 KSR
Brother HR5
Brother HR 1
Brother HR 15
Brother HR25
Brother HR35
Juki 6100
Quen-Data1120
Oaisystep 2000
Qume 9 45 FFP
Qume 9 55
Qume 11 40
Qume 11 55
Nec3510(S or P)
Nec2010 SorP)
Nec 2050 (for IBM)
Diablo 620 RO
Diablo 630
Ricoh 1300
Ricoh 2300RP
Ricoh 2600RP
Tec FI0-40
Tec FI0-50
Smith Corona TP1
Silver Reed EXPM2CPS)
Olympia ESW103 KSR
AUTO SHEET FEEDERS
Genesis (for Juki/Tec/Nec RicotvDiablo
Rutishauser Mechanical
Rutishauser Electro Mechanical
Tractor Feeds
CONSUMABLES
Parallel Cables
Serial Cables
Auto Sheet Feeds
Tractor Feeds
Dust Covers
Disk Storage Boxes 5 25“
Disk Storage Box 3 50"
Computer Paper (2000)
Ribbons for all printers
5 25" Disks (SSSD'SSDO)
3 50" Disks (Box)
MONITOR & VDU
£299
£395
£479
£159
£25
£20
from £250
from £175
from £10
£25
£23
£99
£339
£349
£159
£159
£125
£99
(Please ring lor add-ons and Soft.)
£289 £329
£359 £499
£389 £433
£239 £299
£349 £395
£199 £249
£219 £285
£329 £438
£339 £450
£356 £475
£456 £569
£859 £1100
£175 £299
£115 £225
£895 £1059
£999 £1195
£299 £399
£195 £260
£479 £599
£599 £749
£479 £599
£349 £399
£199 £235
£219 £260
£149 £174
£459 £550
£489 £600
£239 £299
£359 £449
£468 £595
£445 £495
£659 £799
£1590 £1985
£45 £55
£199 £249
£289 £359
£459 £578
£1249 £1575
£1190 £1435
£685 £795
£1195 £1347
£1795 £2199
£1990 £2475
£845 £950
£1745 £1890
£1690 £2250
£850 £1095
£985 £1175
£499 £599
£890 £995
£139 £169
£195 £245
£129 £169
£446 £595
£339 £449
£559 £759
£695 £925
£329 £399
£295 £375
£239 £375
£1495 £1890
£1650 £2350
£1195 £1400
£1259 £1577
£1390 £1595
£599 £795
£699 £890
£695 £855
£1560 £1950
£990 £1295
£1400 £1695
£1750 £1995
£895 £1295
£1250 £1695
£189 £229
£295 £329
£799 £998
MONOCHROME
Sale Price RRP
Sanyo SM12N (Green. 15mhz)
Sanyo DM8112 CX (18mhz)
Philips 12" (Green)
Kaga 12G (Green)
Kaga 12A (Amber)
BMC 12" Green
BMC 12 High Res
Novex (Amber)
Yanien (Green Amber Tilt-Sw)
Swivel 4 Tilt Monitor Stand
COLOUR
KagaK12R1
Kaga K12R1X
Novex14"
Luxor 14" (Super Res. 800dot)
Dyneer14CMI 640x200
Dyneer 14CHI 720x350
Sanyo CD3125N (360dot)
Sanyo CD3117M (620dot
Sanyo CD3115H(720dot)
Fidelity CM14 12mhz RGB & COI
Novex High Res, 14"
TERMINALS
Qume QVT 102
Qume QVT 108
Qume QVT 211GX (Tektromcs)
Qume QVT 103 (Dec VT100)
Kokusai KDS (TV1925 WS)
Kokusai KDS (STD)
Hazeltme Esprit
Hazeltine Esprit II
Hazeitme Esprit III (TV 1950)
PLOTTERS
HP 7470
Watanabe MP1000
Watanabe WX4636
MT Pixy Plotter (with SF)
ACT Writer 80
Act Writer 81
Gould Bryans DP7
Rowland DXY800
£69 £89
£89 £129
£79 £95
£98 £119
£110 £137
£79 £89
£99 £119
£99 £125
£85 £99
£19 £25
£199 £225
RGB PAL £239 £295
RGB £229 £395
£495 £598
£399 £450
£575 £650
£169 £199
£295 £369
£399 £499
£179 £199
£199 £235
£495 £595
£629 £756
£856 £1195
£729 £910
£449 £595
£425 £545
£449 £495
£455 £525
£825 £995
£795 £893
£699 £795
£2565 £2880
£495 £599
£528 £595
£695 £749
£1255 £1495
£475 £595
SOFTWARE
Video shop package Optician system Employment agency
Bucket shop package Stock control system. VAT control
system Job costing system £1950
PS Above Packages include Training Computer Monitor
Software Printer
News agents system
Integrated travel agents system
Motor trader int system
Insurance brokers
Autocad (2 Dim CAD Package)
Sage Acc Executive
Pulsar Compact Peachtree Peagasus
Pertmaster Milestone
Lotus 1-2-3 Symphony (IBM Dec Wang)
Open Access
Framework
Dbasell
Friday
Card-Box, Plus
Omms I/ll'III
Everyman Knowiedgeman
Concurent CPM86
Multi tool word W Mouse
Multimate
Superwriter V110
Supercalc 2'3
Multiplan
Micromodeller
PFS File Report
Copy II plus (IBM Apple)
TK' Solver
Castle Wollenstem
Sargon It, III
Millionaire
Frogger
Zaxxon
Pinball
Flight Simulator
If you can find the software printer monitor that you looking
for call us tor a better price and details
COMMUNICATION HARDWARE
& ADD-ONS
Acoustic coupler (Epson TWL) £160
Buzzbox Modem Auto Answer E79/E119
Minor Miracles 300 1200 £170
Master Systems 21 23 AA AD Modem £299
Oacom AA AD EC Modem £479
Smart Modem (IBM) £50
One to One (Send & Receive Telex) £495
Braid Telex System EPOA
Micromaii (Sinus Apncot) £295
Koiapad touch tablet (Ap IBM) £75
Apple IBM C64 Atari Joystick £39
AstMpc Quod Cards lor IBM PC XT EPOA
Mouse (IBM Apncot) £125
Hercules Grt Card C290
Plus-5 Ext 10MB HD for IBM Epson etc £1125
STAT RadixIOFT(80COL200CPS) £459 £578
£500
£750
£1000
£1500
£650
£295 £590
from £150
£650 £295
£295/£479
£395
£490
£295
£159
E139E295
£156 £299 £399
£379 £395
£175
£255
£250
£150
£195'£235
£150
£395
£169
£29
£190
£19
£22x29
£35
£23
£25
£19
£29
INTERNATIONAL COMPUTER ENTERPRISES
HOT LINES FOR INFORMATION & ORDERS
01 -543 6866 01 -542 4850 TLX: 8813271
SHOWROOM
85-85A Quicks Road Wimbledon London SW191EX
Export. Educational. Dealer. Governmental, Lease, Rent. Part Exchange Enquiries Welcome
All items new and carry manufacturers guarantee Prices are exclusive VAT and Delivery
FORTRAN
Access to full address space.
Full implementation.
UNIX
Idris* Unix version 6 lookalike
Multi-user, Multi-tasking.
COMPUTER W TECHNOLOGY
Up to 6 users and a printer. M68000,
8 Mhz no wait states. 12,18,40 Mega
byte disc. Can add another 3 discs
and a tape streamer.
Hardware floating point board
available in the Autumn.
For the CP/M*enthusiast there is also
CP/M68-K, with SVS Fortran and SVS
Pascal. Both compilers can access
allot memory.
Call to arrange a demonstration
and run your benchmarks NOW:
knowledge
Vo SOFTWARE IIP
18 Lea Springs, Fleet, Hants GU13 8AS.
Telephone: Fleet (02514) 7453.
Telex: 858893 FLETELG.
* UNIX IS A TRADEMARK OF BELL TELEPHONE LABORATORIES.
• IDRIS IS A TRADE MARK OF WHITESMITHS LTD.
* CP/M AND CP/M68-K ARE TRADE MARKS OF DIGITAL RESEARCH
PC W 261
TRANSELECT
MICROCOMPUTER SERVICES
5 CLIFFE ROAD,
GODALMING,
SURREY
Prices
Hardware
Inc. VAT
Commodore 64.
£ 169.00
SX64 Portable Computer.
£ 699.00
1541 Single Disc Drive.
£ 185.00
MPS 801 Dot Matrix Printer.
£ 185.00
C2N Cassette Deck.
£ 39.00
Software
Superbase 64.
£ 85.00
Calc Result.
£ 85.00
Please enclose Postal Order/Cheque (mode payable to
Transelect) with order to the above oddresss.
Macintosh
easV touse
system
Midlands
’phone (0203) 23000
for details of
• Competitive price
• Personal demonstration
• Full support service
• Personal delivery and
training service
throughout the UK
Adelphi Business
Computers Ltd
25 Trinity Street
Coventry CV11FJ
Tel: 0203 23000
Also Lisa 2, Apple lie, Apple III,
Apple He
^cippkz
authorised dealer
r Do you own or use two or more computers with incom¬
patible disk formats? Then you need our universal
«FILE MOVER
This easy-to-use file transfer program enables you to transfer
any type of files - including .COM-, .CMD- and .EXE-types of
files - from one computer to another by means of a senal link -
even if they use different operating systems! A special protocol
with checksums and automatic retransmission ensures error-free
file transfers
Available for CP/M, CP/M-86 and MS-DOS (PC-DOS).
Prices: For CP/M : £ 49.95
For CP/M-86 or PC-DOS (MS-DOS) : £ 69.95
For any two o/s’s : £ 99.95
We also offer the following easy-to-use and well-documented
utilities:
* XSUB for CP/M-86 : £39.95
* DiSK UTILITY PACKAGE for CP/M (2.2) : £ 79.95
Includes disk dump and patch, disk test, dupli¬
cation and various file recovery utilities.
«The file recovery aid alone makes it worth the
price». «— very well -designed and friendly
human interfaces** (Microsystems).
* TERMINAL for CP/M, CP/M-86 and PC-DOS
(MS-DOS) : £99.95
converts your microcomputer into a powerful termi¬
nal. Includes ASCII file upload and download facilities.
Disk Formats available: 8" ss/sd, IBM-PC/XT, DEC Rainbow 100,
Osborne, Zenith hard and soft sector, Superbrain (JR),
DEC-VT 180 (DD), Tl Professional (DD), Kaypro II, Access ss/dd,
NEC PC-8001 A, XEROX 820 (SD), Xerox 820-11 (DD), TRS-80,
Mod I (Omikron (CP/M), TRS-80, Mod 3 (MM/CPM),
Morrow Micro Decision.
Include £ 5 per order for handling and shipping. Specify
computer, disk format and o/s.
VISA accepted.
ek
elektrokon/ult <w
P.O.BOX 846, N-3001 DRAMMEN, NORWAY
V
Tel: *(47) 3 83 15 00
MACINTOSH
APPLE 32 TECHNOLOGY
AT A PRICE YOU CAN AFFORD
Macintosh is the perfect small business computer based on the powerful and
much acclaimed Apple Lisa. It will help you to prepare letters and reports, run
the company accounts, produce charts and presentation slides and more
importantly it is easy to use. It can be set up in minutes, learnt in hours and will
last for years.
Call in for a free demonstration or phone for a comprehensive information pack.
MACINTOSH. The lightweight
computer module has a high
resolution 9' screen and a built-in
3Va disk drive. It is accompanied b\
a keyboard and the famous mouse.
ALL FOR £1795
Inc. MacWrtte and MacPaint
Software._
MACINTOSH SOFTWARE
Microsoft Multiplan £149.00
Microsoft Basic £99.00
Microsoft Chart £99.00
12 months software
maintenance contract £200
(Prices ex VAT)
i should
naveone
HSE
■ OS
Full after sales
service and 1 year
guarantee
Open Mon- C
Sat 9.30am-
6.00pm
THE BUSINESS COMPUTER STORE
241 Baker Street, London NW1. Telephone: 01-486 7671
262 PCW
1
We asked Sam to fetch our
line analyser, protocol converter,
host emulator, EPROM programmer,
break-out box, parallel interface
tester, current loop interface tester,
RS 232 interface tester
and printer.
Here it is...
‘...a tough little
package that saved
eleven times its price
in productivity.’
Ferret (The first
. ‘or tt - f < Mf your nearest distributor:
GCS Technology Inc 13500 Midway Road. Suite 314. Dallas. Texas 75234. US Tel (214) 239 3621. Telex 8605236
GCS Engineering Ltd 13 Mount Road, Feltham. Middlesex TW136JG. Englan : r o 01 898 5251. Telex 8955177 GCSC'
theus e(
Syrnp^ 00 ^ rorn _
(jetting t/ic right/computer
At the Byte Shops we’ve helped countless companies of all sizes improve
their efficiency by the introduction of microcomputers. Generally these are
required to perform routine business tasks-but, however similar the
application, we invariably find that no two customers have exactly the same
requirements. When you come to the Byte Shop, you’ll find that we are far
more interested in finding out what jobs you require the compute' to do both
now and in thefuture. We then tailor a complete system including not only
the hardware but the software, and the peripherals to meet your individual
needs. We believe this is the only sensible way to sell computers. On this
spread you’ll find a number of ‘ Typical Ready To Run ’systems. However
we won’t sell one to you - unless you force us -
without asking a few questions first.
WHERE TO FIND US: O
Tweedale Ltd! a success! ufiloinmTrm^m ^ Ch with ic rW:j
ineypurcnaseaanibM PCw
an AnadexDP9500 printer.
The system runs Pegasus accounting software
coveringsales, purchase, nominal ledger and
payroll General efficiency has improved with the
benefits of access to detailed sales analysis and
reporting, up to the minute statements and debtor
lists. The most dramatic time savings have been
made on the payroll which used to take all dav with
a pencil, rubber and big book”, and is now
completed in Ya hour flat! David Tweedale also uses a
word processing package for documents and
quotations which gives them a far more efficient
presentation.
ACT APRICOT
Already an outstanding success,
the transportable Apricot offers
a comprehensive specification
at very low cost, making it a
perfect system for the small
businessman. The Xi models offer
the advantages of Winchester
disks in their most compact size
yet-the revolutionary ZYi" disk.
New 12" screen is an optional
extra for all models at a cost of
£100. Included in the price are
three operating systems MS/DOS
2.0, CP/M-86+, Concurrent
CP/M-86togetherwith Microsoft
and Personal BASICS, SuperCalc,
SuperWriter, SuperPlannerand
Asynchronous File Transfer
Software.*
Since the move to a more spacious
office/showroom complex in
St. Vincent Street, Byte Shop
Glasgow has gone from strength
to strength. Manager Gordon
Coventry and his enthusiastic staff
are determined to offer their
PROGRAMMERS \ _
CORNER
Wide selection of
programming languages, plus
i| utilities and tools from Microsoft,
Digital Research, Microfocus,
Xitan and Pulsar, incl. Basic,
Fortran, Cobol, Pascal,
Assembler,
C&PL1.
customers the facilities and service
to be expected from a true
professional business centre. This
applies whether you are a small
company looking at computerisation
for the first time, a businessman, or
DP professional. The bulk of
Byte ShopiGlasgow’s business is
with the IBM PC, but you’ll find them
just as knowledgeable on the other
models on this spread.
THE BYTE SHOPS* W
ON GETTING THE R
From
1395.00 ex. VAT
1395.00 c/w single 315Kb floppy
diskdrive & 9" monitor
1595.00 c/w twin 315Kb floppy
diskdrives & 9" monitor
1795.00 c/w twin 720Kb floppy
diskdrives & 9" monitor
2495.00 c/w 5Mb hard disk &
315Kb floppy diskdrive & monitor
2795.00 c/w 10Mb hard disk &
315Kb floppy diskdrive & monitor
* Subject to availability
Apricot FI (not illus.)
The revolutionary, transportable
FI, offers the small businessman,
for the first time, a full featured 16-
bit micro that won’t break the
bank. Top specification includes
standard 256Kb RAM
expandable to 768Kb, lx 720Kb
floppy diskdrive, MS-DOS and
Concurrent CP/M compatibility,
remote operation, full featured
keyboard, optional ‘mouse’
facility, ultra high resolution colour
graphics. The stylish FI comes
with three popular software
TYPICALAPRICOT BUSINESS SYSTEMS
packages, SuperCalc,
SuperWriter and SuperPlanner
. 995.00
Apricot Portable (not illus.)
A range of three highly innovative
portable models with memory
options from 256-512Kb standard
RAM and 720Kb single f oppy
disk storage. Stunning
specification includes
sophisticated speech recognition
system, cordless full function
keyboard, cordless‘mouse’(top
models as standard) and flat LCD
screen. Complete with SuperCalc,
SuperPlannerand SuperWriter
software. Stylish matching printer.
10Mb storage unit and carrying
case will also be available as extras
.from 1695.00
ALL PRICES EX. VAT
Financial Planning
Apricot; SuperCalc 3 upgrade; c/w dot
matrix printer. 2299.00
Word Processing
Apricot, SuperWriter; c/w letter quality
printer. 2079.00
Database Management
Apricot Xi; dBase II; c/w dot matrix
printer.3335.00
Small Business A/C System
Apricot Xi; Pulsar Sales, Purchase and
Nominal Ledgers and Invoicing; c/w dot
matrix printer. 4379.00
COMART COMMUNICATOR
Comart Communicator multi-user systems have expandability built in
and are the most cost-effective way of sharing computer power amongst
your staff. You can start with a Communicator system to suit your current
requirements-up to nine people can share-and simply add new
terminals as you grow. A considerable saving over buying a complete new
computer each time.
COMMUNICATOR MULTI¬
USER BUSINESS SYSTEM
Communicator CP1525M with M - BOS
operating system, including 5 display
terminals, dot matrix printer andcabtes^
COMMUNICATOR
MULTI-USER MULTI¬
PROCESSING SYSTEM
£1800 peruser
Communicator CP520MP including 5
display terminals, cables 6 x processors
and 6 x 64Kb memory 9095.00
user'system.
IBM/PC
The IBM PC’s versatility means
that it’s equally at home in a small
business or as a stand alone desk
top in a large corporate company
linked to a main frame. Should you
require extra performance or
speed, the IBM PC XT is an
obvious choice.
IBM dual 320Kb disk drives, 64Kb
RAM, UK keyboard and screen
. 1988.00
IBM PC dual 320Kb disk drives 128Kb
RAM DOS 2.0, UK keyboard and
screen. 2149.00
IBM PC XT 1 x 320Kb floppy disk plus
1 x 10 Mb hard disk, 128Kb RAM, A
SYNCHCOMMS, DOS2.0, UK
keyboard and screen. 4141.00
PC/XT ADD-ON’S & ADD-IN’S
Alloy PC-Backup - cartridge tape unit
for backing up, storing and retrieving
data from hard disk. 1,750.00
I From 1988.00 ex. VAT
Microvitec 1446-14" colour monitor
. 495.00
Expansion Unit 1 -10 Mb hard disk
unit for PC. 2,172.00
Expansion Unit 2 -10 Mb hard disk
unit for PC/XT. 1,978.00
Tallgrass Datasave - 5Va" hard disk
mass storage unit with 12,20 or
35 Mb capacity plus integral streamer
tape cartridge backup..from 2,820.00
Hercules Graphics Card - allows high
resolution bit mapped graphics on
monochrome display. 395.00
AST Megaplus Cara - includes 64 Kb
RAM, 1 serial port plus clock/calendar
+ RAM spooler software. 319.00
AST 3780 Card & Software - allows
PC to communicate with m/f in bisynch
protocol. 875.00
AST 5251 Card & Software - allows
interactive m/f comms with IBM
Systems 34, 36 & 38. 835.00
PC Net Starter Kit - local area
network allowing file and disk sharing
plus optional electronic mail from
. 1350.00
PC Net Cards -to link additional
terminals to network from. 675.00
Quadram Cards -full range available
inc. memory expansion & colour
graphics from. 194.00
IBM colour monitor plus adapter card
. 685.00
IBM printer inc. cable. 469.00
Epson FX80 printer inc. cable 478.00
Brother Letter Quality Printer.. 445.00
See Microserve panel for details of full
maintenance and service facilities for
the IBM PC/XT nationwide.
ALL PRICES EX. VAT
SYSTEM
SPOTLIGHT
TYPICAL IBM BUSINESSISYSTEMS
Word Processing
IBM PC; Multimate c/w letter c,
printer. 3075.00
Colour Spread Sheet
IBM PC; colour monitor; Symphony;
full width dot matrix printer c/w 2 pen
plotter. 4999.00
Information Management
IBM PC XT; dBase II, dot matrix printer
. 5119.00
Accounting System
IBM PC XT; Sales, Purchase and
Nominal Ledgers. Invoicing and
Payroll; c/w dot matrix printer .5720.00
ALL PRICES EX. VAT
Compaq System
New to our roster of ‘approved’
micros is the exciting new ‘Plus'
from Compaq - a portable model
which is fully IBM PC/XT software
compatible. Spec, includes 256Kb
RAM, single 360Kb floppy plus
10Mb hard diskdrives, with both
colour monitor and printer
interfaces, keyboard, high
resolution screen and carry case.
Our special offer this month
includes the ‘Plus’with ‘Symphony’
integrated software package
combining Wordprocessing,
Spreadsheet, Database, colour
graphics and communications
SPECIAL PRICE . 4999.00
HERE YOU CAN COUNT
At a tftivicc Computer Cheektiot
BBC
Model B
Act
Apricot
IBM
[PC/XT
Comart
C' cator
Compaq
Colour graphics
•
•
•
•
Multi-user
•
•
Hard disk storage
•
•
•
Upgradeable
•
•
•
•
Expandable
•
•
•
•
Communications
•
•
•
•
•
Transportable
•
•
•
Networking
•
•
•
•
SELLING SOFTWARE
(P Lotus 1-2-3 - Remarkable
integrated spreadsheet and
information management package
incorporating colour graphics for the
^IBM PC. 375.00
0 dBASE II -Powerful database
management and applications
generator with optional graphics and
^^development tools. 395.00
0 Symphony -Complementary
follow-up to 1-2-3from Lotus including
word processing, integrated
spreadsheet, communications,
^^database and colour graphics. .550.00
0 Supercalc 3 -Latest Supercalc
version with colour graphics rivalling
^Lotus 1-2-3. 295.00
0 WordStar -Most popular
wordprocessing program, easily
integrated with Mailmerge, Spellstar
star index and Supersort
^enhancements. 295.00
0 Pulsar Accounts -Complete
integrated business accounting system
includes sales, purchase, nominal
ledgers, data analysis, stock control,
invoicing and payroll -for Apricot and
O IBM PC.per module 195.00
Supercalc 2 - Sophisticated, easy
to use financial spreadsheet for in
depth analysis, modelling and
^forecasting. 195.00
0 Multi-mate -New standard in fast,
easy to use, function key driven
wordprocessing for the IBM PC
^ . 330.00
0 Open Access -Exciting new
integrated business package rivalling
Lotus 123 with WR Database, comms
and 3-D graphics. 450.00
0 CBASIC -Widely used
^^commercial programming language for
business applications development,
interpreter also available. 107.00
A (CP/M86.232.00)
0 Friday -Personal file management
package for the novice with quick
^custom reporting. 195.00
0 Graphstat- Up and coming
statistics and colour graphics package
forthelBMPC. 195.00
0 Multiplan -Versatile electronic
© worksheet for the IBM PC. 183.00
) Cardbox- Simple to use data
retrieval and information management
© tool. 155.00
) Level 11 Cobol - Mainframe level 11
compiler, well suited for new
applications development: tools and
€ ^utilities available. 965.00
1 Calcstar- Electronic spreadsheet
and financial modelling program -
— ^integrates with Wordstar. 116.00
0 Delta -Comprehensive and
sophisticated database program with
'3-D'file structures, links to Lotus 123,
© Multiplan and Wordstar. 495.00
| BSTAM - Communications
package for sending and receiving
C XP/M files over telephone lines. 133.00
1 Flight simulator -Full colour
■game for both the novice and the
potential fighter pilot on the IBM PC
. 37.00
0 Pascal MT -»- - Comprehensive
integrated language for developing
production quality software. 250.00
(CP/M86.429.00)
ALL PRICES EX. VAT
microserve
An integral part of the ByteiShops,
Microserve provides a complete range of
servicing and maintenance plans
nationwide for computers such as the
IBM PC and Communicator plus
peripherals from Epson, Anadex, Qume,
Wyseand Volkercraig. 'Microsure’ - our
speedy nationwide on site maintenance
contract for a 'once only’ annual fee.
'Microswap' - component exchange
service. 'Micromend' - workshop repair
and up grades. ‘Microcair -on site
maintenance and repair charged on a
time and materials basis. ‘MicrotrairV -
runs product training courses for your
own service engineers. Call into your local
Byteshop for further details or ’phone
0480 215005 for a Microserve
Information
Pack.
• Volume purchase prices available on
request.
• Barclaycard Visa and
Access taken in payment. .
•Account, leasing and HP facilities
available.
• Prices valid for cover date life of this
magazine (September).
•Whilst we carry a vast range of stock
we cannot guarantee that every item
advertised will be available in each shop.
i* bit maims;
somMMc
CENTM
TH£ EUE SHEP
BUSINESS CENTRES
LONDON
324 Euston RoadNWl
Tel: 01-387 0505
Manager Russell Jacques
BIRMINGHAM
94-96 Hurst Street.
Tel: 021-622 3165
Manager Jim Attfield
GLASGOW
266 St. Vincent Street.
Tel: 041-2218202
Manager Gordon Coventry
MANCHESTER
11-12 Gateway House,
Piccadilly Station Approach.
Tel: 061-236 4737
Manager Robin Pimlott
NOTTINGHAM
92a Upper Parliament Street.
Tel: 0602 470576
Manager David Slater
SOUTHAMPTON
23 Cumberland Place.
Tel: 0703 334711
Manager Russ Wilmott
BRISTOL
Tel: 0272 290651
BYTE SHOP HEAD OFFICE
Grove House, Great North Road,
Little Paxton, Cambs. PE194EL.
Tel: 0480 218812
Managing Director Peter King
© Copyright the ByteShop September 1984
IN JUST
ONE HOUR
YOU TOO CAN
BECOME A
VOLKSWRITER.
With Volkswriter Deluxe, anyone
can learn how to become a word
processing expert in next to no time.
That’s because it really is so easy to
use. And it comes with a tutorial diskette
that teaches you its complete range of
facilities - simply and quickly.
Yet it offers all the features of a truly
professional word processor - like a mail
merge facility, plus the ability to process
files from many other leading applications
packages, such as Lotus 1-2-3.
Thousands of users in the States
have already become dedicated
Volkswriters-and now it’s available in
the UK. Just ask your local dealer for a
demo. You’ll have to find out for yourself
- it’s just too easy for words.
Distributed in the UK by
Vaser Ltd., Unit 15, St. George’s Industrial Estate, White Lion Road, Amersham, Bucks. HP7 9JQ.Tel: 02404 5434 Telex: 838895
AT LAST! A SENSIBLE
PRINTER STAND AT A
SENSIBLE PENCE
Patents Pending.
■ Stands neatly on a desk top. ■ Printout stacks tidily in the
tray. ■ Supply paper locates underneath the printer - can
stay in its carton for convenience. ■ Sturdy design, brandy
white finish only. ■ Discounts for multiple orders.
Accommodates most makes of 80-character printers
_ including ■ EPSON MX80 ■ MICROLINE 80 _
Send coupon or telephone for details.
Advanced Resources. St. Gabriels, Much Birch, Hereford HR2 8HY.
Telephone: (0981) 540 262
Please send leaflet and order form for the Advanced Printer Stand.
Name:
EPSON
QX10
PHONE 01-337 4541
Concordia the experts
COMPLETE BUSINESS COMPUTER
INSTALLED FOR UNDER £2,000
Yes a complete system, Printer, Computer and programs for
Accounting Spreadsheet and Wordprocessing. We supply spare
disks, paper, dust covers, we even train your staff. Epson high quality
equipment, Peachtree high quality programs (Peachtext, Mail list,
Peachcalc) and Concordia expert help, an unbeatable combination to
get you started. The simple to use QX 10. Ideal for the first time user,
it also has the power and facilities to satisfy the most demanding
expert. The price includes CP/M, MFBASIC twin double sided double
density disk units, high resolution VDU, 192K RAM, a music
generator and interfaces for RS232, Centronic parallel, and a light
pen. Of course the QX 10 has 16 Bit precision, High resolution
graphics, keyboard graphics, and many function keys. It also gives
you 16 type faces to choose from and they all print out on the Epson
printer. This package is really complete, no extras to buy, we even
supply the 13 amp plugs. All you have to do is write the cheque (The
price £1999 plus vat).
This could be the best investment you have ever made.
RING 01-337 4541 NOW.
Concordia (Est 1971), give aftersales support
Address:
6 CENTRAL ROAD, WORCESTER PARK, SURREY KT4 8HZ
State Printer Model
PCW/9/84
System Science
C Compilers for CP/M-80
Software Toolworks C/80ver 3 £50.00
C/80 Mathpak £30.00
Aztec CM £155.00
Eco-C for Z80 code £185.00
Lisp £45.00, UVMAC Z80 Assembler £35.00, Mychess
£40.00
C Compilers for MS-DOS,
PC-DOS, CP/M-86
Aztec C86 £185.00
Lattice C £420.00
Digital Research C £239.00
Aztec C ] [for Apple DOS £155.00
Forth-83 Standard from
Laboratory Microsystems
Z80 CP/M-80 £79.00
8086/8088 MS-DOS, PC-DOS, CP/M-86 £79.00
M68000 CP/M-68K £195.00
Floating point extensions £75.00
16 Bit Co-Processor Boards for
Z80 CP/M Systems
M68000 processor, 256K RAM, CP/M68K and C 8086
processor, 256K RAM, MS-DOS or CP/M-86. (Enquire
for details).
Please send cheque with order (plus £2.00 pp + VA T)
to our new address:
6-7 West Smithfield, London EC1A 9JX
Tel: 01-248 0962
LARGEST COMPUTER CENTRE
in
MANCHESTER
BBC, COMMODORE, MEMOTECH, SINCLAIR,
SHARP, SANYO DEALERS
COMPUTERS AMSTRAD IN STOCK
BBC Model B PRINTERS
(Free Recorder+Games....
.£399
Shinwa CP80 CTI.
.£219
Electron.
.£199
Epson RX80 FT.
.£289
Memotech 512.
.£275
Mannesman MT80.
.£249
Memotech 500.
.£199
Juki 6100.
.£388
Sharp 711 (Free Recorder).£199
Cannon 1080.
.£339
Commodore 64.
.£199
Alphacom 32.
.£69
Sanyo 550.
. £644+VAT
Olivetti JP101.
.£155
Sanyo 555.
. £878+VAT
Star Gemini 10X.
.£229
Einstein.
Amstrad.
.P0A
.£229.95
DISK DRIVES
Amstrad colour.
MONITORS
.£329.95
Opus, Pace, Cumana
Sanyo 12N.
Sanyo Medium Colour.
.£90
.£227
BBC ACCESSORIES
JVC Medium Colour....
.£199
6502 2nd Processor.
.£199
JVC High.
Microvitec.
.£272
Z80 2nd Processor.
.£299
.£229
Bitstick System.
.£374
Fidelity.
.£217
Graphpad.
..£143.75
COMPUTER STATIONERY, DISKS, PLUGS, SOCKETS, CABLES, ETC.
TELEPHONE ANSWERING MACHINES/CORDLESS PHONES: NOW IN STOCK
Wide range of books, software (Educational software specialist).
Showroom, demonstration facility. Prices include VAT, all items
available mail order. Personal Export scheme. Add £8 p & p if mail
order.
M MIGHTY MICRO M
SHERWOOD CENTRE
268 WILMSLOW ROAD
FALLOWFIELD, MANCHESTER
TEL: 061-224 8117
PC W 267
All our prices include VAT
m
02
CHALLENGE YOU TO FIND A BETTER DEAL
APRICOT
£1 ,999 inc VAT
BUSINESS SYSTEM
COMMODORE 64
CRESTMATT PROFESSIONAL PACK £599
Includes CBM 64 + 1541 Disk Drive + MPS 801 Printer + Easy File + Easyscript
Word Processor + 6 games on disk + 1000 sheets of paper + 20 blank disks +
Intro to basic
CRESTMATT SUPER PACK £219.95
Includes CBM 64 + Super/Saver cassette unit + 3 cassette games up to £25 (£10
limit per tape)
Commodore 64. £174.95
Disk Drive 1541 + Easyscript + 6 games disk + 5 blank discs*. Call
1701 Monitor (High Resolution Colour + Sound). £199.95
Super/Saver 64 Cassette Unit. £34.95
C2N Cassette Unit. £44.95
Green Monitor with leads to Commodore 64. £99.00
SOFTWARE 64 (call for
latest offers)
Vizawrite/Spell
Vizastar
Script 64
Sales/Purchase
Payroll
Nominal Ledger
Future Finance
Magpie
Superbase
Practicalc (spreadsheet)
Assembler Tutor
Intro to Basic I/ll
Simons Basic
Happy Tutor
(typing instructor)
Account Pac Programmers Reference Guide
Simplex Accounts Games
Educational
PRINTERS
MPS 801 50 cps. £179
ShinwaCP80 F/T 80 cps. Call
Epson RX 80FT100 cps. Call
Epson FX80 160 cps. Call
CBM 1526 60 cps. Call
EP44 Brother. Call
Canon PW1080A160 cps. Call
Brother HR1512cps. Call
Juki 6100 20 cps. £359
Daisy Step 2000 20 cps. Call
Canon 1156. Call
Apricot computer — 256K RAM
Twin Micro Disk Drives — 315K x 2
Monochrome Monitor — 9" screen
Fuji keyboard with micro display and numeric
keypad
Superwriter word processor
SuperCalc spreadsheet
Super Planner
All manuals and documentation with MSDOS,
MSBASIC + standard utilities
Shinwa CP80 F/T dot matrix printer, printer
cable, 20 blank disks, box of paper.
Other packages designed to your needs on
request
ITT XTRA
£2,499 inc VAT
BUSINESS SYSTEM
XTRA computer— 128K RAM (operationally
compatible with IBM PC/XT)
2 Double sided disks — 360K ea
Amber monitor with adaptor
Daisystep 2000 (20 cps) daisy wheel printer
Word Star word processor
Printer cable, box of paper, 10 blank disks
Delivery once cheque cleared within 7 days. Bankers’ Drafts, Building Society Cheques, Post Orders 3 days only
Post & Packing per item, £4; overnight, £7; software — no charge
COD £3; for orders above £100 a deposit of £10 is required. Prices subject to change without notice + goods are subject to availability.
No credit Cards
‘Offers strictly limited for one month
CRESTMATT LIMITED
RING 01-402 1254/5 - 01-723 4699 01-749 2510 (24 hours) • Telex 267653 (DRAKE G.)
Baker St.
Marylebone
Edgware Rd.
Baker St.
Marylebone Road
York St.
Showroom/Mail order: 67 York Street, London W1
268 PCW
ANALOGUE MEASURING UNITS FOR
THE BBC MICRO AND EPSON PX8
EXCET EMU3 MONITORING UNIT (not PX8)
Measures temperature, light, resistance, power, volts, current and time.
(Leads and probes supplied)
£86.00
E.C.G. HEART/PULSE MONITOR
Displays E.C.G. trace, both visual and audio pulse rate and personal details.
(Leads, pads and gel supplied)
£86.00
GAS DETECTOR INTERFACE (not PX8)
Measures concentration in p.p.m. of 6 different gases.
(Supplied with gas sensor in holder)
£65.00
PRESSURE TRANSDUCER INTERFACE
± 1-1000 p.s.i.
Displays in p.s.i., Nm2 or atmospheres. Specify range.
(Transducers extra)
£55.00
P.H. PROBE INTERFACE
0-14ph
Uses R.S. standard PH probe and powders.
(PH probe and powders extra)
£55.00
STRAIN GAUGE
£55.00
Elasticity or compression up to 1 % strain.
(Strain gauge supplied)
FREQUENCY METER INTERFACE (not PX8)
0-200Hz, 0-2kHz, 0-40kHz
Accuracy <0.5%
(Leads supplied)
£55.00
OSCILLOSCOPE (not PX8)
Response DC & AC to 5kHz or above
Three ranges:— 0-1 OmV; 0-1V; 0-1OV
(Leads Supplied)
£86.00
All units are extremely accurate and have fully supporting software
on 40 or 80 track disc or tape. All with a screen dump facility and
audio/visual variable alarm levels. Display is in graphical form,
extra-height characters or tabular display with variable sample rate
from 0.1 secs to 1,000 hrs with print out option.
All prices exclusive of V.A.T.
Demonstration video film showing the Excet EMU3 under working
conditions available for free hire. Video film of other units to follow
shortlv BITS & BYTES
44 FORE STREET
ILFRACOMBE, NORTH DEVON
Tel: (0271) 62801
PC W 269
kcyzonG
SOLID STATE DESK TOP
SWITCHING DEVICES
THE PRINTERSHARERS
PARALLEL
EX. VAT
26 PIN (AS BBC) 3 MICROS TO 1 PRINTER
26 PIN (AS BBC) 6 MICROS TO I PRINTER
36 PIN (AMPHENOL) 2 MICROS TO 1 PRINTER
36 PIN (AMPHENOL) 3 MICROS TO I PRINTER
SOLID STATE SWITCHING
* Solid State Switching
* Extra cable lengths
* No plugging/unplugging
* Easy to operate
* Simple installation
SAVES TIME & MONEY
* Saves time
* Saves money
* Connect in multiples
* No limit to sharers
* 12 months warranty
THE PRINTERCHANGERS
PARALLEL
EX VAT
26 PIN (AS BBC) I MICRO TO 3 PRINTERS £
36 PIN (AMPHENOL) 1 MICRO TO 2 PRINTERS £
36 PIN (AMPHENOL) I MICRO TO 3 PRINTERS £
OPTIONAL
MPI - DC mains power pack for sharer/changer £6.50
LEADS - PARALLEL
26-26 PIN 2 MTS £9-Each
26-36 PIN I MT £10-Each
26-36PIN 1.5MT £12.50Each
26-36 PIN 2 MT £15-Each
SERIAL - RS232
3 way 25 pin Printersharer/Changer
LEADS-SERIES
25 pin D type plug on each end -2MT
25 pin D type plug on each end -5MT
Pack of 3 £25-
Any cable can
be made to order
EX VAT
£75-
EACH PACK OF 3
£12- £34-
£14- £39.50
Portable Software!
for the
TRS-80 MODEL 100
NEC PC-820IA
. OLIVETTI MIO
MPLAN £46.00
- 90 Row x 26 Column SPREAD SHEET
- Labels, Constants, Variables, Formulae
- Full Replication, Direct and Relative
- Save/Load to/from RAM or Cassette
- Many Special Math & Printing Functions
MSOLVE £46.00
- MULTIPLE EQUATION SOLVING Package
- 20 Equations & 99 Variables per System
- 10 Extra Functions & AON Calculator
MBRAIN
- full RPN CALCULATOR w/ visible stac
- 30 Functions, 6 Special Calculators
z_Double_ Precision_Accuracy____ === ===_=
MICROTIME INTERNATIONAL LIMITED^ ^
106A BEDFORD ROAD, W00TT0N,
Tel. (0234) 767758/766351
/ 1 4 nrp available on rec l ues
T ^AlhJir\JG
p HOGRAM/VH/\fG
| INTERFACES FOR APPLE
80 Column Video Display Card II & //e
£125.00 1
I 80 Column Video Display Interface //e
60.00 1
I Extendable 80 column Video Display Card //e
69.00 I
f Extended 80 column Video Display Card //e
99.00 |
Serial Communication Card II & //e
95.00 I
| Serial Printer Card II & //e
65.00 1
Serial Printer Card //e with rear panel strap
72 00 1
| Parallel Video Graphic Printer Card II &//e
65.00 1
I 4 Channel 8 Bit A/D Converter II & He
110.00
I 4 Channel 1 2 Bit A/D Converter II & //e
125.00 1
"SLIMFAN” Clip on Fan with mains suppressor.
f 1 power socket & plug
42.50 1
KEYZONE LTD
f U 1 4, Regeneration House, School Road, Park Royal, London 1
l NW10 6TD. Telephone: 01 -965 1684/1804 Telex:
r\i
m
00
00
I P&P Sharer/Changer £ 1 .50 each. MP1 & Leads £0.
50
1 Interfaces £ 1.00 each
and associated
support
SERVICES
'"''-MOUSE- and
COURSES INCLUDING
' / Zv°rv% vu cIBASE
' EW and ADVANCED
plUB
• WordStar ^
m ... • Super Calc
• Ma,lMerge
9 CP /VI
• MS- DOS
C «^ JRSES BASED OAI * HANDS-ON•
SSIONS and EXERCISES
'd&ASP in
" APPLICATIONS \a/ritten
SPECIFICATION
TO
LAi ^Tech
Information Systems Ltd.
WllV/OSOPI 58182
58013
270PCW
Discount Micros!
SAVE HUNDREDS OF£££$
on the BEST RANGE OF MICROCOMPUTERS at the BEST PRICES!
— Full system
64K System Unit
2 x 320K Drives
Keyboard
High Res. Monitor
C20QCL
£1798*
9=sinus i — Full system
128K System Unit
2 x 600K Drives
Keyboard
High Res. Monitor
T22QCL
£1698*
MBC 550
128K System Unit
1 x 160K Drive
Keyboard
Spread Sheet
Wordstar
'£800.1
£598^
apricot — Full system
256K System Unit
2 x 315K Drives
Keyboard
High Res. Monitor
comma
(Fully IBM compatible portable computer)
^CSfirisi/ — Full system
(Portable Computer)
— Full System
256K System Unit
2 x 320K Drives
Colour interface
Keyboard
High Res. Monitor
I ^
oH
R
Of 1 -J
64K System Unit
2 x 200K Drives
Keyboard
High Res. Monitor
rtTOCL
£1398*
Tt9GQ
including a range of software FREE
£ 2200 .
£998 1
£1798*
including over £1000 worth of software
FREE
APRICOT
256K 10MB + Mon.£2388
256K 5MB + Mon.£2148
256K,2 x 720K+ Mon .£1698
256K, 2 x 315K + Mon.£1398
COMPAQ
256K, 10MB.£3298
256K, 2 x 320K.£1798
KAYPRO
Kaypro 10.£2095
Kaypro IV.£1395
Kaypro II.£998
IBM PC
128K 'XT' 10MB.£3698
128K 'XT' 10MB Colour.£3898
64K 'PC' 2 x 320K.£1798
64K 'PC' 2 x 320K Colour.£1998
SANYO
MBC 550 (128K, 1 x 160K).£598
MBC 555 (128K, 2 x 160K).£798
Mono Monitor.£116
Colour Monitor.£198
SIRIUS
256K, 10 MB.£2998
256K, 2 x1.2MB.£2198
128K 2 x 600 K.£1698
SPECIAL!
OLIVETTI M20
T2;5GO
Other machines on request.
Plus a whole range of software & peripherals.
To place your order for IMMEDIATE
DELIVERY, call Vanessa James on
01-938 1721 (20 lines)
CD Quote on CD Information on CD Ring me
CD Urgent
Name _!_ Title _
Company _
Address _
r...
2 Discount Micros Ltd.
7 Kensington High Street, London W.8.
■ Please send me
■ Phone
L......
Postcode
Extension
PQW^84
*Offer lasts for limited period only and is subject to VAT
and change without notice!
Rebalance this sh
The BBC Micro can now give an
astonishing new account of itself.
Because with Acorn soft s new 16K
ViewSheet ROM, it develops a head for
figures which can save you a vast amount
of arduous brain work.
Imagine, for instance, that you had to
make several adjustments to a balance
sheet
If you made those adjustments on
ViewSheet it would revise the balance
automatically in a split second.
Or imagine that you had to add 15%
VAT to every figure on a pricelist contain¬
ing 500 items.
ViewSheet ca n add t he tax to eachand
every one of those items simultaneously.
And once again, in virtually a second.
As simple as pencil and paper.
ViewSheet is a computer-based
spreadsheet, the figure processing
version of a word processor.
With 255 columns in width and
255 rows in depth, it’s also one of the
largest spreadsheets on the market
Originating the sheet is as easy as
originating an ordinary worksheet with
pencil and paper.
Because ViewSheet comes with an
easy-to-follow reference card.
It enables even the most inexperienced
users to feed all the data they need to use,
and store on disc or cassette, into the BBC
Micro.
\ou can nominate headings and sub¬
headings. And you can create barcharts to
display figures graphically.
Ten windows for perfect vision.
The sheer size of ViewSheet makes
it impossible for the whole sheet to he
visible on the monitor at once.
That’s why ViewSheet has ten wi ndows,
enabling you to see up to ten different
sections of the sheet at any one time.
You can summon the windows onto
UOa
« * j.
li^SB £•*•»«■ w ,
Jr
Com *** «• 41M
*i38 M
flHj I
eet in one second.
the screen at the press of a key.
You can cross-reference sections, or
even reposition them on the sheet, when¬
ever you need to.
And you can print them out individ¬
ually, as well as all together.
The possibilities are virtually endless.
By creating special disc f iles from
ViewSheet, you can link two or more
spreadsheets together. Ph i s mea ns you can
build models much bigger than the
BBC Micro s considerable memory.
ViewSheet is also compatible with
Acornsoft’s View word-processing
package. This enables you to pro¬
duce reports and documents which ^Hl
combine text and figures.
In addition, you can use
ViewSheet in
any screen
mode.
making the most of the BBC Micro’s
potential. And if you use it with the 6502
second processor, you’ll have no less than
30K of workspace in any mode.
For only £59.80.
you too can have figures like this.
The ViewSheet ROM can be fitted by
your BBC Micro dealer in less than three
minutes. And with its straightforward
user guide, function
ence card, it’ll soon have you
juggling figures at lightning
speed.
Indeed, at only £59.80, it’s
an inval uable asset for anyone involved
in professional or personal finance,
forecasts, formulae and
analysis.
ViewSheet’s operations and functions in brief.
The operations supported by ViewSheet are:
addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, exponen-
tation and bracketed operations.
A nd the funotions supported are: A BS, ACS, ASN,
SIN, SGN, RAD, ATN, COS, DEG, EXP, INT, LN,
LOG, PI, SQR, TAN, MIN, AVERAGE, MAX, CHOOSE,
LOOKUP, COL, IF, READ, ROW and WRITE.
JCORNSeFT
c/o Vector Marketing, Denington Kstate, Wellingborough,
Northants NN8 2RL. Tel: 0933 79300.
BACKUP your troubles
in your old CLIP bag
CLIP — Compressed Library Interchange Program
CP/M CP/M-86 MS DOS MS DOS 2 0 £95.
• Backs up a Winchester
on to floppies.
• Compresses text or data to
less than half size.
• Large files can span multiple
discs.
• Selective backup or retrieval, on an
inclusive or exclusive basis.
CLIP has no equal in reputation,
convenience, power or economy.
CLIP comes standard with Winchester
systems supplied by CIFER SYSTEMS,
RESEARCH MACHINES and OLYMPIA.
_lit
CLIP offers effortless backup.
You can prepare new commands using a
question and answer routine. Then name
each command for later use: to run it, the
name is enough.
*NEW* CLIP has its own menu, with seven
prepared commands. Customise the
commands if you wish, or edit the menu text
with a word progessor. Or keep the standard
forms. All your housekeeping —
save/restore/review — by pressing two keys.
Put a CLIP in your Winchester now!
o
All prices excl. VAT, post free in U.K.
Most popular disc formats from stock.
KEELE CODES LTD
University of Keele, Keele, Staffordshire, U.K. Tel: [0782] 629221 Telex: 36113
fct A
Computer Su p plies
• diskettes
• ribbons
• paper
A comprehensive range
at exceptional prices
we know computers
Cambridge Computer Store
I&4 Emmanuel Street, Cambridge
A
Emmanuel St.
Our new Personal
Computer Centre
specializing in
the BBC Micro
with complete support
we knew computers
Business &
Professional
Tel: 0223 65335/4
Home &
Educational i
Tel: 0223 358264
Cambridge Computer Store
I&4 Emmanuel Street, Cambridge
Telemod 2 takes you and your micro into a whole
new world of possibilities and opportunity.
Take Prestel? for example. For news, travel and
holiday information. Teleshopping, Homebanking. Telex,
and CitiService financial information.
Or explore Micronet 800,
where hundreds of free games are
yours forthe choosing. as well as an
ever-expanding range of educational,
household and business software.
Take advantage of electronic
mail by exchanging messages
and programs with other users-
anywhere in the world!
The Telemod 2 from OEL
(Europe's largest volume
manufacturer of modems) uses
advanced 1C technology to bring
universal communications with
enhanced reliability-at a down-
to-earth-price.
To make the most of Telemod 2, we offer a
comprehensive choice of viewdata communications
packages for popular micros such as BBC. Apple II. and
HE, CBM 3000,4000, & 8000-64 and Tandy Models
I& III. These packs contain appropriate interfaces and
software, any necessary
connectors, and full instructions.
FTices range from around
£15-660.
With Telemod 2, you can
simply turn the remotest
possibilities into reality. Just return
the completed coupon first.
. r ^
□
11
□
—r*
Microcomputer
‘Prestel and the Prestel symbol
are trademarks of British
Telecommunications..
O.E. Limited
Industrial Estate
Appleby-in-Westmorland
Cumbria CA16 6HX
Telephone 0930 51909
Telex 64157 Electronic Mailbox No. 093051909
tPlease allow 28 days for delivery.
Tick
i i(.r\
r n Please send me the Telemod 2.1 enclose a cheque/
L P.0, made payable to O.E. Ltd for £84.95 inc. VAT.t
r Please send me more information on the Telemod 2
L ; and full details about communications packages
Name—
Address
_TeL
276 PC W
ACORN ELECTR ON WITH FREE COMPANION
EXPANSION UNIT
The Companion Expansion is a rugged
aluminium case that bolts firmly onto the
back of the Electron. It contains a six slot
mother board with three connectors
installed that can be used to expand your
Electron to a more complete system.
Apple Marintnsh
Macs To Take Away
Ex-Stock i!
£ 1790 ♦ Voucher
For V 2 Price
I mage writer
BBC
While Stocks Last
BBC ‘B’ £329.00 + vat
BBC ‘B’ with
Disk Interface 1
and Disk Drive £525.00
JSS** 1 *
+ VAT
12 MONTH EXTENDED WARRANTY
ON ALL BBC EQUIPMENT
COMPSHOP PRICE PROMISE
— We guarantee to match the
price on equipment offered
from stock through any other
supplier.
Educational
enquiries and
orders welcome.
Quotations given.
One year warranty
on all products.
COMPSHOP was established in
1978 and has continually offered
the best in micro computers
to discerning customers.
We sell only
computers and
peripherals, and
therefore can
offer the support
many other
shops cannot.
. ^
All prices quoted are exclusive of VAT. Delivery is added at cost.
Please make cheques and postal orders payable to COMPSHOP
LTD., or phone your order quoting BARCLAYCARD ACCESS
DINERS CLUB or AMERICAN EXPRESS number.
14 Station Road, New Barnet, Hertfordshire, EN5 1QW
(Close to New Barnet BR Station - Moorgate Line)
Telephone: 01-441 2922 (Sales) 01-449 6596 Telex: 298755 TELCOM G
OPEN (BARNET) - 10am - 7pm - Monday to Saturday
Acorn Electron £173.00 + vat
Companion Exp. Unit £29.00 + vat
Printer & User Port £19.90 + vat
Sideways ROM Board £19.90 + vat
Joystick Board £12.90 + vat
Prototyping Board £9.90 + vat
Boards in Development
Disk Interface
Memory Expansion
Relay Board
Serial Communications Board
Econet Interface
550
Single Drive
128K RAM
MS-DOS
BASIC
Wordstar
Calcstar
£699
VAT
Additional
Drive /
£150 /
+ VAT
SANYO
tt£*C699
555
Dual Drives
128K RAM
MS-DOS
BASIC
Wordstar
Calcstar
Mailmerge
Report Star
Data Star
£949
+ VAT
CHEAPEST IBM COMPATIBLE EVER!
APPLE
£489 + VAT
Apple 2e
Drive with
controller
Additional
Drive
80 Col Card
Printer Interface £79 + vat
Epson RX80FT £259 + vat
Philips Monitor £79 + vat
£199 + VAT
£159 + VAT
£79 + vat
EVERGREEN
APPLE
PACKAGE
DEAL
£1299
+ VAT
PERIPHERALS
MONITORS
Microvitek 1431
£179 + vat
Philips 7001
£79 + vat
PRINTERS
Epson RX80FT
£259 + vat
Epson FX80
£359 + vat
OK Microline 80
£179 + vat
CUMANA DISK DRIVE FOR THE BBC t
CSX100 Single 100K
£125 + vat
CS100 Single 100K
£139 + vat
CD200 Dual 200K
£269 + vat
CD800 Dual 800K
£419 + vat
CD800S Dual 40/80 800K
£449 + vat
Torch Z80 Disk Pack
£675 + vat
Torch ZEP100 Z80 Processor
£329 + vat
PC W 277
UCSD Pascal
Goes DOS
Now you can penetrate the
expanding world of MS*-DOS
and PC-DOS while writing
applications in the language
programmers love:
UCSD Pascal*. The original.
The fully-developed industry
standard. Complete with exten¬
sions for system development
and commercial applications
programming.
You can write programs in
UCSD Pascal and execute
them under the control of PC-
DOS or MS-DOS. Without fuss
or complications.
It’s made possible by TDI
Limited,distributors of the
Start with the basics: UCSD
Pascal, a complete set of
development utilities; a full¬
screen, full-function editor and
a file manager.
Add another language. Or two.
Such as FORTRAN-77 or
BASIC. Our compilers generate
compact code and are truly
integrated with the
development environment.
Edit with ease. When an error
is detected, the editor may be
invoked and positioned at the
statement in error.
You can also write in smaller
program segments. This
simplifies debugging and
testing and lets you use
common procedures in
multiple applications. Even if
they were written in one of our
other languages.
For professional developers,
we also offer a full set of
productivity tools such as
assemblers and a symbolic
debugger.
Clip and mail the coupon
below. Or call us on
0272-742796. We’ll send you
information on the extensive
list of TDI’s products.
You’ll find that UCSD Pascal
goes MS-DOS. And a lot of
other places besides.
UCSD Pascal is a registered trademark of T
Regents of the University of California.
_ __
£1000 ins’
mite lot«
The ■
Electron
. £ 199 . 00 ;
Europe’s No. 1
Group of Retail Outlets
Check our multi-national
network for your nearest
dealer
Backed by an after-sales
service second to none
Another Winner From the Big M Stable
The Electron - A thoroughbred from the
manufacturers of the BBC, who have incorporated all
their experience and knowledge to conceive another
winning computer. Many BBC programs are
compatible. This full colour 32K ROM and RAM
computer with text and graphics includes a cassette
input, and a multi-way connector for the addition of
expansion units containing interfaces to additional
hardware. It has a 56 key full travel QWERTY
keyboard, 10 user-definable and 29 pre-defined keys
enabling BASIC keywords to be entered in a single
keystroke. The Electron comes with free introductory
cassette containing 19 programs including a number of
exciting games. £199.00
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Prices
TORCH Z80 Disk Pack
800K - £803.85
Dual disk drive with Z80
second processor and
CPM for BBC. Gives
BBC 64K of usable
RAM.
£199.00 ^
Commodore
64
Commodore 64 - £199.00
Colour sophisticated
ROM/RAM user, UHF/
Composite video, high
resolution graphics.
Sinclair ZX
Spectrum
£129.95
48K
Sinclair ZX Spectrum -
48K basic, colour
r and text graphics. - £128
*• *• *- «f $• i* JU}
*• r - to* Km ii
4 ~ *- *- %m !Lm 4^ mm mjm a
COMING SOON
* Commodore
Plus-4 £249.00
av
Commodore
16 Starter Pack
includes Cassette Unit,
Introduction to Basic and 4 Software
Programs for only £129.95
MONITORS
RGB Colour Monitor STD/RES £228.85
RGB Colour Monitor H/ RES £632.50
12" Green Monitor £99.00 12" Amber Monitor £120,
BBC Model B - £399.0
Full colour 32K ROM
Computer with text am
graphics 80 column tex
screen, extended
Microsoft basic, built i]
assembler 1MHz and tu
interface, sideways RC
RS 423, A/D converter.
75
Double Density DFS - £120.00
Disk controller for the BBC Micro. Up to
2MB on line storage. Auto internal format
programs for 5V4" and 3" drives. Acorn
compatible runs basic, wordwise, BCPL,
view forth etc. 25% faster than Acorn
DFS on file access. Auto 40-80 track
switching. Compatible with .1 DFS view
and sideways ROM.
Double
Density
DFS
£120.0 ft
★ ★
★ The Big Intern
Bucks
Citybench
2/4 Eaton Place
Marlow
Tel: 06284 75244
Micro Land
Weatherburn Court
Brunei Centre
Bletchley
Milton Keynes
Tel : 0908 368018
Cambridge
G C.C Cambridge Ltd
66 High Street
Sawston
Cambridge
Tel: 0223 835330
Cornwall
Computavision
4 Market Street
St Austell
Tel: 0726 5297
Derby
First Byte Computers
10 Castlefields
London Road
Derby
Tel: 0332 365280
Deron
Computer Systems (Torbay)
Pump Street
Bnxham
Tel: 08045 6565
Roy Hart
Computer Services
10 Fore Street
Tiverton
Tel: 0884 253468
Dorset
Solent Micro Systems Ltd
25 Bargates
Christchurch
Tel 0202 470468
Durham
General Northern
Computing
8 Whitworth Road
South West Ind. Estate
Peterlee
Tel: 0783 860314
Essex
Essex Computer Centre
216 Moulsham Street
Chelmsford
Tel: 0245 358702
Focus Computer Systems
140A Hathaway Road
Grays
Tel: 0375 79717
County Computer Stores
5a West Square
Harlow
Tel: 0279 414692
The Home Computer Centre
261 Victoria Avenue
Southend-on Sea
Tel: 0702 43568
Gloucs
The Model Shop
22 High Street
Stroud
Tel: 04536 5920
Sabre Consultants Ltd
103 High Street
Tewkesbury
Tel: 0684 298866
Harts
County Computer Stores
95a South Street
Bishops Stortford
Tel: 0279 506801/2
Hobbyte
153 Grove Road
Harpenden
Tel: 0587 3542
N. Humberside
Beverley Computer Centre
1 Windmill Passage
55 Lairgate
Beverley
Tel: 0482 881911
S. Humberside
Ashby Computer Centre
186 Ashby High Street
Scunthorpe
Tel: 0724 871756
Kent
Tollgate Computers
249 Beaver Road
Ashford
Tel: 0233 37187
Canterbury Software Centre Miracle Computers
Data Store
6 Chatterton Road
Bromley
Tel: 01 460 8991
9 The Friars
245a Coldharbour Lan>
Canterbury
London
Tel: 0227 53531
Tel: 01 274 7700
North Kent
Computer Centre
52/54 Bellgrove Road
Welling
Bedley
Tel: 01-301 2677
Greater Mancheste
Entertainment m Leisui
88 The Rock
Bury
Tel : 061 797 3463
Lancs
Amat Computing
67 Friars Gate
Preston
Control Technology
184 Market Street
Hyde
Tel: 061 366 8223
Tel: 0772 561952
Middlesex
London
Enfield Communication
Henry’s Computer Shop
135 High Street
404 Edgware Road
Ponders End
London
Enfield
Tel: 01 402 6822
Tel : 01 805 7772/7434
★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★
DWP20
aisy Wheel Printer
ONLY £299.00
Two New
Products
from
QUEN-
DATA
i ACORN AND BBC
DISKDRIVES
Disk Drive 100K Single
£201.25
Disk Drive 200K Single
£241.50
Disk Drive 400K Single
£396.75
/ Disk Drive 800K Dual
£711.85
f Executive 80
Electronic
Office
Typewriter
With 2 Line
display
ONLY £459.00
PRINTERS
Astron JP80 (as ill.) £199.00
MCP40 (Colour Printer)
£171.
Epson RX-80 Printer
£314.00
Epson FX-80 Printer
160cps £399.00
35
rHTTiT71
APPLE
HOME
PACK
Ci
anal Dealer Network
Joystick & Cassette
Players -
Many joysticks and
cassette players available
from stock. Just in ...
The BBC Compatible
Crack-Shot. £10.95
This special complete pack contains:
Apple ile Personal Computer, disk
drive and controller. TV Modulator
(colour and sound) • £25 Apple
Software rebate certificates
£100 Training Voucher • £25 Apple
Monitor rebate certificate •
Micronet/Prestel discount voucher
£68 off • 'Windfall 1 Apple user magazine
Apple Sports Bag* Software Certificates •
Catalogue of Hardware and Software £999
SOFTWARE -fC
all leading chart .
software available r*
lstar Computers
egina Road
hall
01 574 5271
Norfolk
Abacus
12a Pottersgate
Norwich
Tel: 0603 61441
Town Computer Store
30 Town Road
Hanley
Stoke-on-Trent
Tel: 0782 287540
E. Sussex
Gamer
24 Gloucester Road
Brighton
Tel: 0273 698424
L. Computers
mdsor Street
•ridge
0895 51815
Viking Computers
Ardney Rise
Catton Grove Road
Norwich
Tel: 0603 45209
Suffolk
Brainwave
24 Crown Street
Ipswich
Tel: 0473 50965
W. Sussex
Bits & Bytes
High Street
Bognor Regis
Tel 0243 867143
ulse Computer World
lartford Street
entry
0203 27711
Somerset
Sinewave Computer
Services
Corporation Street
Taunton
Tel: 0823 57526
Micro Management
32 Princes Street
Ipswich
Tel: 0473 59181
Surrey
Concise Computer
Consultants Ltd
1 Carlton Road
S. Croydon
Tel: 01 681 6842
Orchard Business
Systems Ltd
34 East Street
Horsham
Tel: 0403 68461
verhampton Compu
itre
19 Lichfield Street
lverhampton
0902 29907
Staffs
Eric Reynolds Ltd
86 High Street
Burton-on-Trent
Tel: 0283 65086/65869
Worthing Comp-
Centre
32 Liverpool Road
Worthing
Tel: 0903 210861
Tyne & Wear
Video & Home
Computers Centre
3 Roxburgh House
Park Avenue
Whitley Bay
Tel: 0632 534725
N. Yorkshire
Skipton Computer Systems
16 Swadford Street
Skipton
Tel: 0756 68192
W. Yorkshire
Thoughts & Crosses
37 Market Street
Heckmondwike
Tel: 0924 402 337
Wales
Automation Services
42 Dunraven Place
Bridgend
Mid Glamorgan
Tel: 0656 3550
Scotland
Micro Store
38 The Arcade
King Street
Stirling
Central Region
Tel: 0786 64571
N. Ireland
Everyman Computers
80 Charlotte Street
Ballymoney Co Antrim
Tel 02656 62116/62658
For your nearest European
Dealer telephone Belgium oi
Holland
Belgium
Micro Management
Belgium
Ballaerstraat 75
2018 Antwerp
Belgium
02 238 9284
Holland
Micro Management
Nederlands
Raad Huisstraat 98 2406
Ah Alphen aan den-ri|n
01720-72580
VouH have to spend over
£3000to beat our
£199 Second Processor.
The BBC Micro is already one of the
fastest and most powerful micros around.
But with the addition of the 6502 Second
Processor, it becomes the fastest micro in its
price range.
(To be fair to the opposition, their
£3000+ package includes a disc drive. But a
similar BBC Micro set-up with the 6502 Second
Processor will cost you less than a third!)
The 6502 greatly expands the Micros
usable memory. Its 64K of RAM combines
with the BBC Micros 32K, for a total of 96K.
It is supplied with its own special
version of BBC BASIC, called Hi-BASIC,
which allows the maximum amount of this
memory to be used for BASIC programs
and variables. Other languages allow some
or all of this memory to be used for
programs, and many will auto¬
matically adjust themselves to
make maximum use of avail¬
able space.
Whats more, the 6502
uses the same microprocessor as the BBC
Micro, but at a much higher speed. Which
means programs can run up to 50% faster.
The 6502's extra power enables it to run
more powerful software, such as that provided
with the Acorn Bitstick, which turns the BBC
Micro into a versatile computer graphics
station. In fact, it has a variety of features
usually found only on much larger systems.
It can also exploit the full potential of
local area networking through the Eeonet
system, with Level 2-File Serving.
So to get the most from your BBC Micro,
get the 6502 Second Processor.
The 6502 Second Processor is available
from your BBC stockist. For the address of
your nearest
supplier, ring
01 - 2000200 .
If you wish to order
by credit card,
phone 0993 79300
during office hours.
6502 Development Programs
( available seperatelv )
MASM: A 6502 macro-assembler. A full range of
macro facilities are provided, including looping
recursive calls and conditional assembly.
XREF: A cross-referencer to be used in conjunc¬
tion with MASM.
ViewEdit: A full screen editor based on the VIEW
word processor.
TRACE: A 6502 trace package for de-bugging all
types of program.
PRINT: A program to produce formatted
assembly listings without using MASM.
The package is provided with a 250-page manual
describing all the facilities provided by the system.
Technical Specifications
The Second Processor operates at a clock rate of
3MHz. A version 1.2 MOS will need to be fitted
into the BBC Micro before operating the 6502.
Integral power supply
Measurements: 205mm x 345mm
Weight: 2.1 kg
Colour: BBC Computer cream
Construction: Moulded top and bottom to match
BBC Computer profile. ABS injection moulded
plastic.
Power in: 240v, 50Hz, 3w.
The BBC Microcomputer System.
Designed, produced and distributed by Acorn Computers Limited.
Introducing
The New Epson Micro Printer
At Only £99*95 inc.VAT
Ideal for use with the BBC Micro, and most popular home computers.
Parallel and RS232 versions available.
/
X
A Compact thermal printer
packed with superior features.
Now there is a light-weight, high performance compact printer that
is suitable for portable and home computers — the Epson P-40
thermal printer.
Quality and Versatility
The Epson P-40 is part of the new P range,’ which offers a micro printer with
print quality identical to that found in the Epson range of superior printers.
The P-40 is the first low cost printer that can print 480 dots per line which
means it can reproduce graphs, and pictures beautifully. The P-40 can offer
three kinds of column capacities: 20 columns, 40 columns and 80 columns
(condensed) —no other compact printer offers such a selection.
Eight, Quiet and Cost Efficient.
Since the P-40 is a thermal printer, operation is particularly quiet and there’s
no ink ribbon to change. Maintenance is simple. In addition the P-40
portable battery-driven printer has four rechargeable NiCad batteries built
into the printer which can be recharged in 6 hours. It’s simple, economic
and easy to use.
Top Quality Image and High Speed Printing.
The quality of printing in all Epson printers " 1 . ••• , ^ Y .
is unequalled and the P-40 is no exception. * ' lmV '.-ruUV .
A superior Epson head design featuring nine
dots together with it’s ability to express small
letters ensures superior legibility.
The compact P-40 also provides high speed
printing with 45cps.
Self Test Function
The P-40 compact thermal printer has a
useful self test function.
High Resolution Print - Actual Size
Specifications
Print Method
X
Actual Size:
Just27Hix8‘ 2 '(\x/)x57d>
Thermal Dot Matrix
Print Speed
45 Characters per second
(For 40 and 80 column setting)
Print Direction
Unidirectional (Lett to Right)
Character Set
96 ASCI 1 character, (Featuring
English Capital Letters, English
Lower Case Letters, figures, signs
and graphics)
Character Size
(mm)
2.4 (H)x 1.7 (W) Normal
2.4 (H)x.85 (W) Condensed
2.4 (H)x 3.4 (W) Enlarged
Paper
Epson Thermal roll paper P-40
TRP
Paper Feed
Friction Feed
Paper Width
112mm
Power Supply
NiCad Batteries, Internal
WATCH OUT FOR
THE NEW EPSON P-80
COMING SOON
>( 0442 )
60155
ORDER BY PHONE OR BY POST
Please rush me_
and_
_Epson P-40 Micro Printer/s
. boxes of Epson thermal roll paper. 11 m roll
Name _
Address _
Tel No:
The Epson P-40 thermal printer costs £99.95 (inc VAT). i
A box of Epson Thermal roll paper costs £9.95 (inc VAT) — 5 rolls. ■
Please add £3.00 tor postage and packing per printer Please allow 28 days tor delivery. v
You can pay for your P-40 micro printer by cheque or by credit card.
I enclose a cheque for £_
My credit card no is _
E3S
To order your Epson P-40 now,
just phone 0442-60155
and ask for Angela.
>(0442)
60155
Data Efficiency Ltd
Maxted Road, Hemel Hempstead, Herts HP2 7Lk Tel: Hemel Hempstead (0442)60155. Telex: 825554 DATEFF G
micro FAST Latest Bargain Prices
DISKDRIVES
iPPH0£127
inc VAT
Single
100KS/D40T. £190.43 +VAT = £150
200KSankyo3"40T £160.87 + VAT = £185
400K Mitsubishi 40/80T... . £173.04 + VAT = £199
400K Mitsubishi 40/80T £215.65 + VAT - £248
Double
400K Sankyo 3" 40T. £320.87 + VAT = £369
800KCumana80T. £355.62 +VAT = £409
800K Mitsubishi 40/80T .. £425.22 + VAT = £489
SUNDRIES
Computer Concepts ROMs from
£27.83 + VAT = £32
Acorn Business Software £20.87 + VAT = £24
Torch Ext. Processor
+ software £260 + VAT = £299
Torch Ext Processor
+ software + twin drives £651.30 + VAT = £749
Also available: Floppy disks, library cases, cables,
paper, ribbons etc
PROCESSORS
£389
inc VAT
BBC Model B £338.26 + VAT = £389
BBC B’with DFS. £399.13 +VAT = £459
Acorn Z80 Ext Processor £260 + VAT £299
Acorn Electron £173.04 + VAT = £199
Acorn/Kenda DFS Kits from. £84.35 + VAT = £97
DOTMATRIX
Epson RX80
Epson RX80 FT
Epson FX80
KDC FT-5001
£190.43 + VAT £219
£221.73 + VAT £255
£329.56 + VAT £379
£203.47 + VAT £234
Mannesmann Tally MT80 £195.65 + VAT £225
Star Gemini 10 £216.52 + VAT £249
Printer Cables £10.43 + VAT £12
Prices shown are for cash &
carry sales and are correct
at time of printing
ALL PRICES
INCLUDE VAT
Export price list available.
Mail order and credit
cards accepted
OPEN 9-6 Mon-Sat
01-7291778
MONITORS
Monochrome
Sanyo DM2112
Sanyo DM8112CX
Teco with zoom
£75
inc VAT
£65.21 + VAT = £75
£89.56 - VAT - £103
£91.30 + VAT = £105
Colour
Microvitec 1431. £169.57 +VAT = £195
1431 (RGB/PAL/AUDIO) ... £195.65 +VAT = £225
1451 (RGB/PAL/AUDIO) ... £295.65 +VAT = £340
Microvitec 1441. £433.91 + VAT = £499
ITT TV/Monitor. £243.47 + VAT = £280
DAISYWHEEL
MODEMS
Selection of acoustic couplers
and mini-modems in stock
*BT approved
•Portable models
*Low cost
micro
£375
inc VAT
JUKI 6100. £326.08 +VAT = £375
Daisy Step 2000. £251.30 + VAT = £289
Printer Cables. £10.43 +VAT = £12
Anglia Computer Centre
88 ST BENEDICTS STREET NORWICH NR2 4AB
TEL: (0603) 667032/3/4 TELEX 975201 ACOMP G
Opening Soon
26 PRINCES STREET IPSWICH IP1 1RJ
** TEL: (0473) 214121
M SPECIALISTS IN BUSINESS COMPUTERS
BUSINESS COMPUTERS
Phone (0603) 667032/3 or 21117
APPLE, SIRIUS,
OSBORNE, ANADEX,
IBM*, DEC, EPSON.
★ Complete with professional
back-up service *
HOME COMPUTERS
Phone (0603) 26002/667031
BBC, DRAGON,
COMMODORE 64,
SINCLAIR, ORIC, LYNX.
★ On special offer ★
Call for Price £££
BOOKS AND
STATIONERY CENTRE
Phone (0603) 29652
PROBABLY THE
LARGEST SELECTION
OF COMPUTER BOOKS
IN EAST ANGLIA
ACCESS AND BARCLAYCARD WELCOME
*IBM authorised dealer — IBM Personal Computer
A very high quality product direct
from the manufacturers, contained in
attractive sloping box with low inser¬
tion force socket and neon indicator
for programming fitted as standard,
the software adopts the high efficien¬
cy method for programming 2764
and 27128. This allows up to 100%
faster programming, software in
machine code, supplied on cassette
and can be placed in Eprom. Very
easy to use, menu driven with easy
to use instructions. This unit is com¬
pletely self contained with its own
power supply and plugs into the user
port.
THIS PROFESSIONAL UNIT ALLOWS:
1. Will program 2716, 2732, 2532, 2764 and 27128 Eproms.
2. Copy eprom into memory and compute checksum.
3. Blank check eprom.
4. Program Eprom from memory.
5. Verify byte by byte and compute checksum.
6. Allow buffer start area to be changed.
7. All operating system calls may be used when in menu mode.
8. Semi-intelligent programming. Typical time to program a 2764 8k device is
approx. 50 sec. depending on the data to be programmed.
9. Additional software supplied to enable your own program (basic or
machine code) to be put into eprom with the necessary leader information
to allow calling with a * command. Downshift routine to enable basic
programs to be run is also supplied.
Cost: £46.50
(Please add 15%VAT + £1.00 post and package)
Also available:
16K Rom expansion with provision for 16K Ram for BBC (fully
buffered), separate power leads eliminates bd. crashing when loaded.
Cost: £29.50
(Please add 15% VAT + £1.00 post and package)
Eprom Programmer (as above) for Acorn Atom and Electron (for Electron
user port interface card must be fitted).
Orders to:
H.C.R. ELECTRONICS
Dept. PCW
Industrial Unit, Parker Road
Chelmsford, Essex CM2 OES
Access orders: Telephone Chelmsford (0245) 350188 (24 hours)
284 PCW
HIGH RESOLUTION
THAT COMES
tKHUT RECOMMENDED
“There is no doubt that the JVC range of ECM
>lour monitors is excellent value for money ...
tere is no loss in quality of picture after long
eriods ... and remember, as more and more
^solution is available with new micros, the need
>r a better display will be that much greater.”
High recommendation indeed from Personal
omputer News. Meanwhile Acorn User said:
“It seems that all ‘normal’ and ‘medium’
^solution monitors, including the Sanyo, are
imply inadequate to deal with the Beeb’s graphics
nd text output... The JVC was excellent, giving
lear, legible results ... Was the JVC better than the
licrovitec?* Would I buy one? Yes to both
uestions.”
Our RGB high resolution colour monitor (580 x
70 pixels) sells for £229 95 (excluding VAT) - that’s a
tving of over £100 compared with other leading monitors
f similar specifications.
The unit has a 14" screen and is suitable for the
BC Micro, Electron, Sinclair QL, Lynx, Oric, Apple, IBM
nd most other leading micros.
MODEL REFERENCE
1302-2 High Resolution
RESOLUTION
580x470 Pixels
C.R.T.
14"
SUPPLY
220/240v. 50/60HZ.
E.H.T.
Minimum 19.5kv Maximum 22.5kv
VIDEO BAND WIDTH
10MHz.
DISPLAY
80 characters by 25 lines
SLOT PITCH
0.41mm
INPUT: VIDEO
R.G.B. Analogue/TTL Input
SYNC
Separate Sync on R G B. Positive or Negative
EXTERNAL CONTROLS
On/off switch and brightness control
And naturally there’s a year’s full guarantee.
If you order your monitor by post, you’ll receive it
within ten days by courier service.
Simply post the coupon below to: Opus Supplies Ltd.,
158 Camberwell Road, London SE5 OEE. Or telephone
01-701 8668 quoting your credit card number. Or, of course,
you can buy at our showroom between 9.00-6.00pm,
Monday-Friday 9.00-1.30pm, Saturday.
*Microvitec Cub 14" monitor.
^ To: Opus Supplies Ltd,, 158 Camberwell Road, London SE5 OEE.
j Please send me:
_High Resolution Colour Monitor(s) at
i £229.95 eaqh (ex. VAT).
Medium Resolution Colour Monitor(s) at
£179 95 each (ex. VAT).
. _Connection lead(s) at £6.00 each. i
I I understand carriage per monitor will cost an extra £7.00. *
| (N.B.A High Resolution Monitor including VAT, lead, and carriage I
I costs £279 39 A Medium Resolution Monitor including VAT, lead ■
| and carriage costs £221.89).
I enclose a cheque for £_Or please debit my credit card
I account with the amount of £_My Access/Barclaycard I
I (please tick) no. is - —
. Please state the make of your computer_— i
■ Name_
Add ress--
Star Europe GmbH.. Frankfurter Allee 1-3.
stx-80.
The Si lent.
Prints 60 characters
per second with
muffled serenity.
Standard ASCII, select¬
able international
characters. Block
graphics and bit-image-
graphics. The stx-80.
At a price to start
with. Soft on the ear.
Easy on the purse.
gemini-1 OX.
The Bestsel1er.
No.l in the range,
the gemini-lOX has
swiftly soared to
stardom. 120 characters
fast per second. Eco¬
nomical . Reliable. And
now compatible with
IBM: gemini-lOi. Any
more detai1s? Let us
know. We support you.
gemini-15X.
The Economical.
At Pro-Range.
For professional out¬
put at a reasonable
price the gemini-15X
is hard to beat.
The print-head provides
you with more than 100
million characters.
gemini-15X. The optimal
price/output relation.
delta-10.
The Powerful.
Serial and parallel
interface. 8k-byte
buffer. Macroinstruc¬
tion. 2 x 96 download
characters. Bi¬
directional printing
with logical seeking.
Where others speak of
extras we mean
standard. The delta-lC
delta-15.
The Powerful.
At Pro-Range.
For full power, wide
carriage output the
delta-15 is your
printer. Up to 233
columns width and 160
characters per second.
Just great. Effort¬
less efficiency at
a standard price.
\
New: radix-10.
The Pro.
200 cps, automatic
single sheet feed,
16k-byte buffer, near-
letter-quality. For
the professional use.
radix-10. Setting new
output standards.
From Star.
New: radix-15.
The Pro.
At Pro-Range.
It's super duper. With
super-wide action.
Trovided with every¬
thing a pro asks for.
radix-15. Right
on course.
New: PowerType.
The Typist.
For your computer.
Sets new dimensions in
your correspondence.
With over 100 type
fonts. 18 clear
characters per second.
Serial and parallel
interface. Proportional
printing. PowerType.
Prints as typed. At a
surprising low price.
A year ago software
nothing like this . ?.
narks the advenKof the new age-of database sewwH
:ind of software that executiv is can really work with
to get the right informations at the right time.
Your staff will really enjoy using DELTA. They’ll be able to create their own records,
for apy one of a thousand myriad uses. Imagine having ALL the vital information'
about your business stored on disk - from contracts to car fleet records, cfe$ records
to currency exchanges, customer records to course bookings. Data on fill can be
added:to or amended in seconds, and files searched and sorted at lightni^j speed.
YouHjreally be able to respond quickly and efficiently to changes in the business
world, AND take pqgitive ajction to maximise on whatever situation develops.
Another product for the
DELTA is available for most microcomputers with the PCDOS,
MSDOS or CP/M operating systems, including the IBM PC,
SIRIUS, APRICOT, DEC RAINBOW, HP 150, EPSON QX 10,
XEROX, etc, etc. DELTA is available in 8 European languages
and is also distributed by IBM, DEC and HP.
Personal
Computer
distributed by
IBM United Kingdom
Product Sales Limited
CompSoft DMS
CompSoft DMS
PATIENT DETAILS
XZ)23<(S/678fi
Dale of tyrtH: tHMT
IWiUl SjUtuo: Sto«l#
fUeliatoiv Mo.: Stl 9H628/P
ftJoi.Nlc, Bate: 07 % 83
Her* Ron i W«l
C«Rwlto»t: Hr. T.K.UMU
PAYROLL NUMBER
SURNAME
CHRISTIAN NAMES
HOME ADDRESS 1
2
3
4
DELTA FILES CAN HAVE
'MASTER' RECORDS & SUB-RECORDS.
DELTA
DELTA offers so many powerful functions. Each record can hold
HOME PHONE NO.
N.l. NUMBER
DATE OF BIRTH
SEX
MARITAL STATUS
NO. CHILDREN
NEXT OF KIN
NEXT OF KIN PHONE
JOINING DATE
DEPARTMENT
GRADE
CURRENT SALARY
JOB TITLE
LANGUAGES
O LEVELS
A LEVELS
up to 90 lines of information, and DELTA has a special file
structure where you can attach up to 32,000 sub-records to each
‘master record’. This means that DELTA can grow with you -
right from the most simple mailing or record system through to
the most sophisticated uses of microcomputers. Stock with order
processing, or customer invoicing, or personnel and absence
recording are all in a days work for DELTA. Whatever you use
DELTA for, your datafiles will become an endless source of vital
information to help you run your business.
FURTHER QUALIFICATIONS
SPECIAL SKILLS
HOBBIES
CLUB MEMBERSHIP
RELIGION
TOTAL DAYS ILLNESS
DELTA is truly user friendly. It is designed for busy executives
and DP professionals who need to get the job done quickly.
DELTA offers powerful sorting and selection capabilities, its own
calculation program, PLUS its own report generator to print lists,
reports, mailing labels and even personalised letters. DELTA also
links with LOTUS 123, Multiplan, Wordstar, and Pegasus. Its the
perfect way to make the most of your data.
DELTA PRINTS ALL TYPES OF REPORTS,
LISTS, LABELS & PERSONALISED LETTERS.
Unlike any ordinary database, DELTA can be ready to use on the same day that it arrives on your desk. Simply
use the question and answer routines to tell DELTA what you want to do - later on you can even write your own
menu of options, and hand DELTA over as a complete ‘dedicated’ system for the job it has to do. DELTA is the
modem way to store data - you can confidently regard DELTA as the most comprehensive and sophisticated ^
database on the market today.
If you haven’t already looked at DELTA now is the time to
do so. You can either see it at Compsoft’s headquarters
near Guildford, or we’ll recommend the best local
supplier in your area.
Training courses, a Users Club and ‘Hotline’ service
provide a totally professional after-sales
backup service
Ring us or return the clip coupon to receive a superb 12 page full colour guide to
database software, and a technical summary of DELTA’S main functions. Or chat
on the phone to one of our consultants about your own business application.
Whatever you do, don’t stay in the dark ages about database software - DELTA is
your key to success.
Compsoft Limited, Hallams Court
Shamley Green, Nr Guildford, Surrey
England GU4 8QZ.
Telephone: Guildford (0483) 898545
Telex: 859210
Not another
new company
with a personal
computer.
Most new business software is being enjoys its position among the top 10 British
written for one computer system. electronics companies.
So, it’s hardly surprising that many new So, not surprisingly the ITT XTRA comes
companies are cashing-in with so-called with all the back-up you’ll ever need.
‘compatibles’.
Sadly, their lack of ^in¬
experience shows.
Quite apart from
the fact that these The Compatible Personal Com puter.
machines are only partly compatible, they
often come with little or no service back-up.
The ITT XTRA personal computer has
achieved full operational compatibility with
the IBM PC/XT (the highest compatibility
level, yet achieved).
And it comes from two long established
and respected companies.
It was developed by ITT - world leaders
in IBM plug compatible workstations.
And it’s supplied by STC - which
Fortune 500 lists as one of the world’s largest
industrial corporations.
With over 30,000 employees STC also
We offer excellent
training and we operate
through a nationwide
network of carefully
selected dealers to ensure
really prompt, efficient installation as well as
highly expert after-sales service.
ITT XTRA’s User Manuals are among
the clearest and most practical yet written.
So, if you’re looking for a really
compatible personal computer to suit your
company, you can rely on the security of ours.
For further details, simply telephone
01-300 3033.
ITT XTRA
Personal Computer.
STC BUSINESS SYSTEMS LTD., BUSINESS MICROCOMPUTERS, MAIDSTONE ROAD,
FOOTS CRAY, SIDCUP, RENT DA14 5HT.
STC BUSINESS SYSTEMS LIMITED : MICROCOMPUTERS • DATA TERMINALS • WORD PROCESSORS • TELEX • FACSIMILE • TELEPHONE SYSTEMS
ITT XTR' 1
The SV‘328 just goes
on growing...
With sophisticated 3-channel ADSR sound,
high resolution sprite graphics and a rapidly
expanding library otsoftware, theSpectravideo
SV328 is all you'd expect in a great games
machine.
A slick word processor-style keyboard,
CP/M* compatibility and massive RAM
(expandable to full 144K) puts it in the business
league.
Spectravideo SV 328: Memory -32K ROM expandable to 96K, 80K on board RAM
expandable to!44K: Keyboard - full word processor type, 87 keys, 10 function keys, built
in cursor control: Graphics - 16 colours, 256x192 high resolution graphics, 32 sprites:
Sound - 3 channels, 8 octaves per channel: CP/M* compatibility - to over 3000 existing
software packages: Storage - cassette drive, 256K disk drive capacity Suggested retail
price - £262.
Tomorrows Computers - Today
Spectravideo Ltd, 165 Garth Road, Morden, Surrey SM4 4LH
Telephone: 01-3300101. Tele*: 28704 MMH VANG
Fill in the coupon today and we ll mail you a full technical brochure and latesttest reports of
the amazing Spectravideo range, or see it for yourself at:
and most leading computer stockists.
—..... ■ •liim.
7-5 T' - V'J - r ' —
And for keen programmers, the easy-to-use
and space saving extended BASIC gives total
control of all standard functions.
There's room to grow too-with a complete
range of peripherals already available,
including some of fhe best joysticks in the
business.
At £262 the SV328 is great value for money!
Spectravideo Peripherals: Cassette Drive: Disk Drive - single: Disk Drive-double: Disk
Drive-full Business Pack: Mini Expander: Super Expander: Monitor: Printer with Interface
Card: Centronics Interface: RS 232 Interface: 16K RAM Pack: 64K RAM Pack: 80 Column
Card: Coleco Adaptor: Quick Shot Joysticks.
Also available Spectravideo SV 318: Suggested retail price - £186
" CP/M is a registered trade mark ot Digital Research Inc
f
To: Spectravideo Ltd, 165 Garth Road, Morden, Surrey SM4 4LH
1 I am interested in Spectravideo computers and peripherals. Please send
me the latest reports together with a full technical specification brochure.
■ Name:_
Address:_
Tel. No-
STD Code:
PCW9/84
VDUs
NEW
FROM ONLY £595 RRP
FROM
The Computer
terminals
Distributor
OR CHOOSE FROM
QUME, ESPRIT, TATUNG, FACIT and printers from
QUME, TEXAS, CENTRONICS EPSON etc.
LOWEST PRICES FINEST RANGE
TOTAL SERVICE
Phone or write:
RTS Technology Ltd.
?S3P m Unit 12,
St Pancras Commercial Centre,
||| 63 Pratt Street. London NW1 OBY.
} Please send details of: PRINTERS H VDUs H BOTH HI {
i i
1 !
! NAMF !
1
1 POSITION
| COMPANY AnniJFSS
ffilHUn 01-267 7541
1
! TEL. NO
1
S INF05
DON'T MISS THE
MAGNIFICENT SEVENTH
3ALANCEC\
fCOMPUTEl
'ep.cw.&h
DISCOVER HOW TO
CHOOSE A COMPUTER
ATTHEPCMZfVSW
^ C OR« ''Cd.
3a^ t
OPiriQN
SHOW X
PLAY
AT THE P.
If you're really interested in the world of
micro-computers there's only one place to be in September.
The most popular micro-computer show in the world.
The 7th Personal Computer World Show at Olympia
from September 20th to the 23rd.
Mingle with the giants of the micro world. Find out
what's new and up and coming your way. We think you'll
profit from the experience.
So if you want to be in the know, you know where to be
in September.
-r* The 1984-
Personal
Computer
* Show
* PT£ MBER, OLYMP'^ 1
September 19th - Trade/Press day only.
The greatest micro
show on earth.
TIMES: 10am-7pm weekdays. 10am-5pm Sunday. FEATURES INCLUDE: “BBC Radio Live at the PCW
Show.” Businessman’s advisory centre. Top 20 Games sponsored by Websters. The Leading Edge/the latest
products at the show. Amateur Computer Clubs. “Mastering the Micro” — Top 20 Computer Books/Software.
ADMISSION: £3.50 p.p. Group tickets (10 people and over) £2.50 p.p. Children (under 12) £1.50.
Please apply for your advance tickets to: Montbuild, 11 Manchester Square, London W1. Telephone:
01-486 1951.
PRINTERS «. TO
LOWEST PRICES FINEST RANGE
TOTAL SERVICE
Phone or write:
RTS Technology Ltd,
Unit 12,
: ?X 1 St Pancras Commercial Centre,
J|| 63 Pratt Street, London NW1 08Y.
j Please send details of: PRINTERS EH VDUs EH BOTH EH j
1 1
1 1
j NAME j
1 POSITION 1
| COMPANY ADDRESS j
rcmmn 01-267 7541
1 1
s TEL. NO j
1
| INF05 J
Great value
in disk drives
from CMC!
The new generation of TEAC
slimline 57 4 " disk drives offer
high performance at an
astonishingly low price.
SPECIAL SUMMER PRICES:
(inclusive of VAT) Single Dual
100K (40tpi)
200K (40/80tpi)
400K (40/80tpi)
£120.00 £295.00
£140.00 £325.00
£180.00 £450.00
Delivery £6.00 per item
Major features include high speed data access, one year’s
warranty and choice of capacity from 250K bytes to 1M
bytes; dual drives have independent power supply. All our
drives are available from stock and come complete with
cables, user manual and formatting diskette.
We also stock a wide range of peripherals—phone us for a
price list or see our full product range on Prestel
377550875/76A—
updated weekly.
Cambridge
Microcomputer
Centre
153-4 East Road, Cambridge CB1 1DD
Telephone (0223) 355404 Telex 817445
Who can you trust
to sell you the
IBM Personal Computer?
In some respects, it’s not easy being an IBM
Personal Computer Authorised Dealer.
Each and every one of them has to qualify to
put their name to an exhaustive fourteen page
contract, which specifies in precise detail what we
expect from them.
The longest (and probably the most de¬
manding) clause deals with their obligations to
ensure your satisfaction.
Once accepted, our dealers receive a pro¬
gramme of training designed to make sure
that they can recommend the hardware and
software which will best meet your business
needs.
And install it properly. And service it promptly
under the warranty.
If all this sounds a little harsh, just remember
two things.
Their professionalism is to your
advantage. And, of course, there’s one
part of being an IBM Authorised Dealer
that is very simple.
Selling one of the most adaptable,
durable personal computers on the
market.
For further information phone
01-200 0200 or clip the coupon.
Roger Kojecky, IBM United Kingdom Product Sales Limited,
FREEPOST Greenford, Middx. UB6 9BR. (Tel: 01-578 4399.)
PCW9/84
Name_Position_
Company
Address.
_Tel. No:_
LITTLE TRAMP CHARACTER LICENSED BY BUBBLES INC..S.A. HMS/GGK
LOTUS SYMPHONY
FRAMEWORK
DECISION MANAGER
CAU.FOR DEMONSTRATION
SYSTEM PRICE FROM £1565
LOTUS • ASHTONTATE • PEACHTREE • MICROSOFT • PEGASUS
SAGE • P.CNET • HARD DISK/TAPE BACK UP • EPSON
BROTHER • CONSUMABLES
Authorised Dealer
Authorised Dealer
Buy, Rent or Lease
from The Professionals
Macintosh £1795
THE TRUE COMPATIBLE
apriCOt from £1395
London office: 164 Grays Inn Road, London WC1.
Full Training
Full Support
Full Maintenance
The Professional Way
NEW
Manchester
office
Please send me information on:
Computer Hardware
Software
Consumables
Name.
Company.
Address.
Tel No:
8 Lever Street, Piccadilly, Manchester-Tel: 061-2281686
Manchester office not authorised dealer
□ □ □
Turning a great idea into a profitable
idea isn’t easy.
It needs skill, patience and sheer hard
work. But to be really profitable, it also
needs the backing of a large, respected
company.
At British Telecom we are now
looking for writers of games and
educational programs to help us launch a
new and exciting range of software.
If we like your idea we’ll send you a
cheque straightaway as an advance on
royalties.
Then we’ll package your program,
advertise it and distribute it with the care
and attention you’d expect from one of
Britain’s biggest companies.
So if you’d like to turn your software
into hard cash, simply send your program,
on cassette or disk, to
FIREFLY
SOFTWARE
British Telecom,
Vi/ Wellington House, Upper St. Martin’s Lane, London WC2H 9DL.
Start with
EPSON’S best.
... add a sturdy,
power-supply upgradeable case,
test it thoroughly, package it
with all necessary
leads and manuals,
and add a full year’s
warranty:
The UDM Disk Drive!
Available through UDM dealers,
in single & dual, 40 & 80 track
single & double sided, 5t4 & 3!6 inch
versions with or without power supply
for less than you think.
Please forward me details on
the Epson/UDM range. Q
1 am interested in becoming
a UDM Authorised Dealer. □
Name_
Address_
UNiTED DiSK/MEMORiES
STANHOPE HOUSE FAIRBRIDGE ROAD LONDON N19 3HP 01-263 5026
YOU can go for gold
...with
Fancy pitting yourself against the world's
best at this summer's Olympics?
You can do so without going anywhere
near Los Angeles - with the most
challenging package of programs of 1984.
MICRO OLYMPICS is more than a
game. It's a brilliantly written collection of
ELEVEN track and field events.
And because we know we're going to
sell many thousands of them we've brought
the price right down - to just £5.95.
Ever imagined yourself as another Seb
Coe? Then try to run against the world
record holder at 1500 metres. And if that
distance is too much for you then there's
always the 100, 200, 400 and 800 metres
to have a go at.
Not much good at running? Don't worry,
MICRO OLYMPICS has many more
challenges for you. Why not try your skill at
the high jump or the long jump?
And if you can't beat the computer at
running or jumping then you can always
throw things around in frustration! The
trouble is that it's just as hard to be a
champion at the discus, the hammer or the
javelin.
And the pole vault takes the event to
new heights!
Yes, it's fast, furious fun, pitting
yourself against the world's best times and
distances on your micro.
You may not be another Steve Ovett or
Alan Wells, but with practice you COULD
become the Micro Olympics Champion!
sMCffo
o
tVlHIPV*
Also available from WH Smith &
and all other leading stores WM
1
Play Micro Olympics
— and let your fingers
do the running!
Send for it today
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
>j
i
Please send me.
_ copy/copies of
Micro Olympics at £5.95
□ I enclose cheque made payable to
Database Publications Ltd.
for £ __
I wish to pay by □ Access □ Visa
No____
□ 48k Spectrum
□ Commodore 64
□ BBC B'
□ Electron
Please tick box
£5.95
each
Expiry dat^
Signed..
Name—
Address.
Post to: Micro Olympics offer. Database Publications.
68 Chester Road. Hazel Grove, Stockport SK7 5NY.
T he computer has made m 3
itself at home in our offices, H|
laboratories and classrooms,
In fact, the big problem $g£i
today is providing enough
hands-on facilities for every-
body. That’s why so many
schools, colleges and busi¬
nesses are installing computer
networks, to distribute the -
computer facilities cost-effectively
to more users at a time.
At least, that’s the theory.
THE RML CHAIN NETWORK
- SIMPLICITY ITSELF
In practice, an effective local
area network can be hard to achieve
if the machines you start with were
originally designed for single-user
home computing (as many institu¬
tions have already learned). They
need extra chips, special clock boxes
and power supplies, and often
liberal use of the soldering iron.
UNIQUE UPGRADE
PATHS
The RML microcomputer
system evolves effortlessly
from stand-alone station into
multi-user configuration.
En route to the full
CHAIN network, our new
Shared-Disc System provides
low-cost facilities to several
users simultaneously from one disc-
drive unit.
So if you are thinking of a
multi-user upgrade, look at the RML
CHAIN network before you buy.
It’s the one that has proved itself -
600 times over.
For details contact Tina Davies
at the address below.
RMLCHAIN NETWORK
THE NETWORK THAT GIVES >OU MORE
THE RML CHAIN NETWORK
IS DIFFERENT
With its powerful 380Z server
unit and high-specification 480Z
work stations, you can get it up and
running without any exotic bolt-on
extras.
You’ll find it easy to use, fully-
interactive, and above all reliable.
In fact, the CHAIN network
will support up to 16 simultaneous
users at a lower all-in price than
competitors’ machines with far
inferior performance.
Sales Office: Mill Street, Oxford.
Tel. Oxford (0865) 249866
CAIN THERE BE A MORE
POWERFUL ARGUMENT THAN OUR
600 INSTALLED NETWORKS?
KESEAWaj
INSTA
►LIMITED
oKks
I NNER LONDON EDUCATION
AUTHORITY
A. E R E. HARWELL
BLOOD PRODUCTS LABORATORY
HERTFORDSHIRE EDUCATION
AI THORIT Y >
MARCONI
SIJ FFOLK COl JNTY COl INCH
MRC CRYOBIOLOGY GROUP
(CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY)
I ESTER POLYTEOINK
SS DSH,RE roiJ CATH >n
AUTHORITY
LONDON DOCKLANDS
NEW TECHNOLOGY CENT!'
CHESTER BEATTY I.AH< >i< /•
BIRMINGHAM EDI ( AJK A
AUTHORITY
OXFORD UNIVERSITY
NORTH TYNESIDE
METROPOLITAN B.C.
N EWCASTLE UNIVERSITY
LEICESTER UNIVERSITY
Y BOYS SCHOOL
l ^ I
RESEARCH MACHINES
MICROCOMPUTER SYSTEMS
1#
1#
* « ; |
’
- ,]
1#
□ I
• i
Electronequip
(Authorised BBC Dealer, and service centre)
* SPECIAL OFFERS
Mail order only
* EPSON
RX-80FT £225.25 + VAT
FX-80 £320.88 + VAT
Printer price includes cable for BBC and screen
dump rom is available for £11.50
SIDEWISE
SIDEWISE FITTED
"SIDEWAYS” rom board for BBC Micro.
No soldering required £38.00 + VAT
VOLTMACE JOYSTICKS
*10% off list prices
■m
Discounted price
JSVOLT 14 Voltmace Delta 14B Joysticks .13.46
JSV0LTA0 Voltmace 14B/1 Adaptor Box .13.36
JSV0LT3B Voltmace Delta 3B Twin Joysticks .18.09
Prices subject to variation without prior notification
TRADE ENQUIRIES WELCOME
Access & Barclaycard Accepted
Large Stocks - 24 Hour Despatch
Carriage 46p
5 FREE ACORNSOFT
GAMES & CASSETTE
RECORDER WITH EVERY
BBC SOLD
Electronequip is an authorised Acorn service centre
and has been an Acorn dealer since the introduction
of the Atom. Our demonstration facilities include 20
station Econet and Torchnet systems.
Ref.
BBC Micros
Ex VAT
Inc VAT
ANB01
BBC Model B Micro Computer
348.26
399.00
ANB02
BBC Model B with Econet Interface
389.14
446.00
ANB03
BBC Model B with Disc Interface
409.14
469.00
ANB04
BBC Model B with Disc & Econet Interface
450.01
516.00
3" Micro Disc £129.95
(inc. VAT)
Disc Interface &
Drive
£198.95 (inc. VAT)
Micro Disc Drive for the BBC Micro
The Micro disc drive offers a method of low cost quick access to
programs. The drive is essentially a small version of a 5J" disc
drive and offers similar features to the larger drive.
The data is stored on a 3" disc, this is enclosed in a protective
hard plastic cassette which features a write protect switch.
The micro drive requires the standard Acorn disc interface, but a
new disc filing system rom. Acorn DFS may be exchanged for the
micro DFS for £12.00. The new micro disc filing system can read
and write to Acorn DFS discs.
Thus if a 5$ inch and a micro floppy were connected on the same
cable files could be transferred between them.
Capacity: 80.64 K bytes Transfer Rate: 125k bit/s.
BRANCHES
FAREHAM: 59 WEST STREET (0329) 230670
KINGS LYNN: 17 TENNYSON AVE. (0553) 3782
MAIL ORDER: 36-38 WEST STREET
FAREHAM, HANTS. (0329) 230670
/4C0RN
COMPUTER
Electronequip
36-38 West Street, Fareham, Hants (0329) 230670
Kings Lynn Branch
Tel: 0553 3782
i
BBC
ff
xl | A*
PCW
Thousands of printer and other peripherals bargains.
See our ads on pages 25,30,31,32
£-?>?$-fi
mzm
ffiSKBflgjra
Waum
ll^TO^rf
9Hp&
Microcompute
Your Book.
gnHR
SHHHBll
Wm$ms
?'?>W ;
mm.
Microcomputer Software
And.
What software is
available for your
particular needs?
And what will run
on your system?
What's the
availability, the cost,
the market
acceptance? And
where do you buy?
The Microcomputer Software Directory is the
unique reference guide to every business software
package available. Plus programs for education,
science, home and hobby.
By helping you choose correctly, and buy
wisely, the Microcomputer Software Directory will
soon become your vital aid. Order your copy now.
It's unique and essential.
PRIORITY
ORDER.
Here's every source, every supplier, every service
available today to help you use your
microcomputer to the utmost.
Here are all the facts, figures and advice you
need to answer all your microcomputer queries.
All in one comprehensive, thoroughly
researched, fully referenced volume:
The Microcomputer Users' Year Book.
Systems, communications, peripherals,
training, consumables, consultants-and more-
are all listed for your immediate decision making.
Your microcomputer is invaluable for your
business. Your Year Book will be invaluable for
truly effective use of your micro.
Reserve your personal copy now. Just
complete and send this order form today.
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ADVERTISERS INDEX
A
F
Microcosm Research
171
Seescan Devices
38
Acorn 256/257/272/273/282
Force 4
241
Microfast
284
Sharp
80/81
ACT
167/106/112/113
Fraser Associates
158
Microgeneral
12
Silica Shop
9
Actel Computers
78
Future Computers
75
Micromanagement
279/280/281
Simmons Magee
244
Adcomp UK
78
Micro Miracles
43
Simon Computers
45
Adelphi Business Systems
262
Micro Peripherals
82
Site Isa
78
Advanced Memory Systems
68
G
Microrent
187
Smith Corona
47
Advanced Resources
267
Globel
86
Micro Repair Club
241
Softsel
42/58
Alpha Micros
72/73
Golden Valley Computers
78
Micro Simplex
62
Software Information Ltd
51
Amstrad
104/105
GSL
123
Microtest
6
Software Ltd
IFC
Anglia Computer Centre
284
Microtime
269
Solo Software
79
Ashton Tate
27/29
Microvitec
135
Spaceward
70
H
Microware
35
Spectrum
250/1/2/3/4/5
Haresoft
55
Mighty Micro
267
Star Computers
286/287
B
HCCS
68
Mills Associates
36
Stirling Micro Systems
262
Basy
21
HCR Electronics
284
Miracle Technology
43
Sybex
193
Beebug
38/46
Hisoft
44
Morse Computers
100
System Science
267
Bits and Bytes
269
Home Computer Earners Club
76
M.P.I.
184/185
Brother
103
Homestead Electronics
237
M-Tec
70
The Byteshop
264/265
Honeywell
243
N
T
Tailored Business Systems
165
Tandy
97
c
I
National Extension College
123
Tasha Computers
11/13
C.A.E.
84
Informata
37
Tasman Software
10
Cambridge Computer Store
CCA
CJE Microcomputers
Comart
Compaq
Compshop
Compsoft
Computer Entrepreneur
Computer Market
Concordia
Crestmatt
Crown Business Centre
Cumana
D
Data Efficiency
Datastar
263
14
60
40/41
56/57/59
277
288/289
246
44
267
268
85
39
283
237/19/21/23
Interam
Interface Systems
Interlex
International Computer Enterprises
I.O. Research
K
Kbytes
. Keelcodes
Kempston Microelectronics
Keyaki
Keyzone
KGB Micros
Knights Computers
Knowledge Software
Kuma
n °
2 ^ Ol Computers
261 OE Limited
Office Efficiency Machines
Office Equipment Marketing
Opus Supplies
123 p
263 r
24 PAS Computer Products
74 P.C. Peripherals
2?0 P.C.W. Show
Personal Computers
^2 Philips Business Systems
2 61 Pinner Wordpro
j 4 j Power Testing Sales Ltd
P&R Commiter Shon
139/4/5
276
33
46
245/259/285
Tatung 143
TDI 278
Team Systems 171
Technomatic 260
Tetra Data Systems 66
Texas Instruments 180
Thoughts & Crosses 70
Torch Computers 48/49
Transelect Micro Computer Services 262
53
45
64/65 U
OBC U Microcomuters 190
174
38
53 V
68 Vaser 266
Da Vinci Computer Store
173
Psion
95
Viglen
76/77
Daystar
237
L
Vignesh
242
Dering Systems
236
Lantech Information Systems
270
Q
Quest
Qume
Visionstore
83
D.F.M.
256
Level 9 Computing
187
89
63
Digisolve
125
London Computer Centre
15
w
Digital Solutions
IBC
Lotus Developments
110/111
Digitus
1
Walters Microsystems
70
Direct Disk Supplies
87
M
R
Wolfcrown
77
Discotechnology
67/69
Radiusend
8
Worldwide Micros
71
Discount Micros
271
Marketing Micro Software
61
Rocon
275
Disking
247/248/249
Master Systems
18
Duckworth
85
Mayfair Micros
37
Y
Dysan
54
May Vision
236
s
Young Electronics
45
MBS Microtex
207
Sage Systems
52
MCZ
123
Sakata Shokai
240
E
Memotech
88
Sanyo
98
z
Electrokonsult
262
Microcentre
130
SCI (UK) Ltd
25/30/31/32
Zero Electronics
68
MICROMART ADVERTISERS INDEX
A
G
M
Ack Data
226
GCS
235
Micro Logic Consultants
229
Adder Publishing
215/217
GFG Micro Systems
214
Micro Nation
222
A. J. Denning
221
Grey Matter 227/229/231/233/235
Micro Port
224
A-Line
213
Micro Processor Engineering
217
Alliance
216
H
Morgan Camera Company
228
Altek
219
M+J Software
225
Anita Electronic Services
214
Harrison-Ward Associates
235
Aurac Ltd
218
Hoodless Associates
216
B
B.C. Computers
c
Cairn Associates
Conguin Software
D
David Nissen
Echo Exploration Consultancies
I
IQlug
Integrated Software
213 Jay Business Services
214
K
Kingsley Enterprises
233
226
234
N
National Software Library
Northern Computers
231
224
216 O
Origination
Ramex Technological Research
RJL Software
s
Saltigrade
Selec Software
Screen Scene
Software Technology
Strathem
Supersoft
228
Technology Research
212
230
230
222
232
232
221
226
221/224
232
Peak Microcomputer Services
233
w
L
Peanut Computers
212
Leigh Computer Systems
231
Peterson Electronics
230
West Coast Personal Computers
222
Lerm
220
Photographic & Optical
223
William Stuart Systems
215
Level Software
220
Professional Magnetics
228
Word Capture 2
>25/227/229
PCW
vr Solicitorsuethyself:
one software housetells
ChipChatof an interesting
conversation with its
solicitors. Initial reaction
when the lawyers called was
'Oh, no, what have we done
now?' But the solicitors had
other things on their minds.
Their question was: 'We've
acquired a disk version of M
Basic, and we wonder
whether you could possibly
photocopy your manual and
send a copy over?'
Wastenot: all that
pre-launch publicity for
IBM's Peanut, which turned
outtobethe PC Junior, is
going to be putto good use.
US firm Leading Edge plans
to launch its own Peanut
micro,taking proudplace
alongside its Elephant disks
andGorillaprinters.
QDOSclues: Sinclairhas
sentPCi/l/someQL
documentation which we
aim to publish in November.
However, there's a catch. We
have to pass backto Sinclair
any errorsfound intesting
the routines—presumably,
we send them backwithabill
fordebugging attached.
AndonefortheVAT-man:
a readercalledtosaythather
QL invoice didn't add up
properly. Apparently, there's
some problem with the
figureforVAT. Andwhen The
Financial Timesdec\ded\o
writeabouttheQL,it
renamed the machine the GL.
That couldn't possibly stand
for Ghost Leap, could it?
Open season: 13%of
businessmen are reportedto
belongtogolfclubs,anda
similar number—poor sou Is
—to take no holidays. But
28%owna homecomputer.
No wonder we struggle in the
Open.
Technologytransfer: US
software house Epyx sentthe
Russian Embassy a copy of
its Olympic Games program
to provide some kind of
recreational compensation
fortherealthing.The
Embassy called backtothank
Epyx—andtoaskforanAtari
version ratherthanthe
Commodore 64 one sent.
'Yousee',thecaller
explained,'we don't have
anyCommodore
computers.'
Righton:thepeople
handling publicity forthe
PCWShowdescribe
computer clubs as places
CHIP CHAT
whereenthusiastscan meet
'to share meaningful
programs and experiences'.
Nextthing,there'll be
jacuzzisin every club-house.
Whose washing machine
did you buy?: consumer
choice magazine Which?
picked the Dragon 32 to put
on its Julyfrontcover.The
report inside rated the BBC B
as'best on test', arguing that
'there's plenty of softwarefor
it'. The Dragon was'worth
thinking about'. ChipChat
startedthinkingand
Lisas. The factory has
brought a touch of glamour
toCork: sayyou workfor
Appleand parkingtickets
miraculously disappear.
Production methodsarea
combinationof
labour-intensive assembly
(three screwsinand pass it
on) and sophisticated
testing. Allthetest
equipment is based on Apple
computers, so llc'sare
checked out by lie's, and lie's
by Ill's. Apple isconfident
that no cheating goeson.
Rib-on: if you're
shopping earlyforChristmas
forthe micro man who has
everything,you could do
worse than considerthe
Ribbon Guide. This eminent
volume contains'forthefirst
time, comprehensive
information on all office
machine and business
computer ribbons available'.
And it's updated quarterly.
Other readers' suggestions
for similarly essential
Christmas presents are
welcome.
PRIZE CROSSWORD
code automatically (8)
remembered an earlier
Which?repor\ that was
particularly attracted to the
ZX81 and Atari 400 because
of their spill-proof covers.
Showdown: Commodore
has postponed its Leeds
show because of its moveto
Corby. Bets are now being
taken on the number of
senior Commodore staff who
will finally make the move
north. This month's other
Commodore rumour raises
the possibility thatthe264
was renamed the Plus4
because Amstrad arrived
with its CPC464.
Goodgame(s):CRL
promises a version of the
MagicRoundaboutfor late
summerwhileMikro-Genis
offering Wally instead. Time
for bed.
Smarties: winner of this
year'sapplied statistics
competition, run by London
University and the Central
Statistical Office, was a study
comparing whelks on
exposed and sheltered
shores. Runner-up was'a
wide-rangingcross
disciplinary study of the well
known confectionery
(Smarties) from various
economic and consumer
aspects'. Sinclairdonated
the prizes which were
presented in Sir John
Boreham's office (where
else?). Chip Chat thankfully
notes that the ceremony
was 'brief'.
Ripe Apples: the first thing
visitors to Apple's Cork
factory see astheyenterthe
shop-floorisapieceof
serious Japanese-style
graffiti.'Webelievein
CLUES ACROSS
3 Inversion,forexample,intherace
( 8 )
6 Warmfireforcookingchips(8)
7 Shopsrequiringauxiliary
backing?(6)
8 Groupofcharactersincontention
atcourt(3)
9 Blast!—ajobfor Linda Lovelace?
(4)
10 Welshpriestgetspartofthe
operating system (8)
12 Abitofoneinapolitical
organisation (6)
13 Statements in support of
metrication?(7)
15 Malfunctionthatdoesn'tbear
examination (7)
17 Chips thinly sliced (6)
18 Catchinoccultmedium(8)
22 Statement of basic literacy. . .(4)
23 . . . andonethat'sconclusive(3)
24 Perform an operation on Siamese
twins?(6)
25 Machinerequiringsmallchange
from one travelling to work (8)
CLUES DOWN
1 Novel output device, perhaps(6)
2 Graphicbattledisaster(6)
3 Fishing,perhaps,tomake
connectionsinthesystem(7)
4 Carrugonegetsonthe
computerised production line (10!
5 Poorrateforemployee(8)
6 Joinedasacurrentsafe-guard(5)
11 Hollerith'sfortune-teller?(4,6)
14 Sparealtimeterpartneededfor
this process (4,4)
16 Ahugthatcouldprovedeadly(7)
19 AwardforadiskGaryputoutin
Melody Maker (6)
20 ?Yes(6)
21 Communist rising started by
company programmer (5)
Cut out or photocopy your entry and
submit itto PCWby 19 September.
You could win£10!
July winner : R Freeman, Ware, Herts.
July solutions: SOLUTIONS ACROSS
7 Magneticdisks 9 Register 10 Atari 14 Halt 15 Hash total 17 Directory
18 Menu 23 Clive 24 Emulator 25 Random numbers
excellence, comradeship
and self-fulfilment', ora
messagetothateffect, isthe
jointdeclaration bythe
200-strong workforce who
produce some 400 lie's a day,
togetherwith ll'sjll'sand
SOLUTIONS DOWN
1 Ampersand 2 H9 3 Femto 4 Micro 5 Ideal 6 ASCII 8 Starttime 11 Iteration
12 Nasty 13 Third 16 Line noise 19 Acorn 20 Melon 21 Jeans 22 Dummy
26 EG
Sendyourentriesto: PCW, Prize Crossword, 62 Oxford Street, LondonWIA
2HG
Name_
Address_
312 PCW
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business problem
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FORTUNE
liiniKi:
*
Never have the right information to hand? Now Apple
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illustrate — with all the variety of a desktop — but in¬
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Imagine: you select tasks, or edit text and data, by
moving a ‘mouse’ on your desk to move a pointer on
the screen.
Simple? Certainly. But ready for the most complex
tasks.
This sample screen shows Mac’s pull-down menu,
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Apple have
put your
finger
on it!
Live Music
Archive
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Free Audio
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Cleveland
Museum of Art
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Console Living Room
Open Library
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Understanding
9/11